Pocket Deep
by thir13enth
Summary: Zuko visits Aang, Katara, and their young daughter in Republic City after a long while. Something tugs at his heart, but he keeps his feelings pocket deep. Modern AU. Zutara.
1. Chapter 1

**So, here's another Zutara piece that I'm pumping out. I plan for this story to be a two-shot, mostly because if it were a one-shot…meh, there's an excellent divide in the story line that I want to exploit so this story is going for two chapters—unless for some reason, my inspiration drags it so that it continues for three or more chapters. Whatever the case, enjoy, my delightful readers!**

**Ah, postscript that I almost forgot to mention—this story is very AU, so stay with me!**

* * *

Republic City.

The last time he had set foot on its urban streets, the metropolis was just beginning to construct its first steel-frame buildings and the news reports were full of apprehension about the length of the suspension bridge to be built across Yue Bay. Even in the daytime, there were just a few pedestrians along the streets and an even more sparse number of carriages rocking along on narrow cobblestone roads, making a ruckus down the entire avenue.

_And now look at it, _Zuko thought, as he received the change for his now wrapped gift. He returned the thanks of the cashier girl behind the counter and stuck his free hand in his pocket. Opening the door back to the newly developed city, he couldn't help but marvel again at how much had changed since he last came here. Crowded seas of people that went about their merry way, phones attached to their ears; offices, cafes, and apartments one after the other down the straight gridline streets; skyscrapers literally touching the clouds, in competition with the mountains…

_Very unlike the Fire Nation, _he reminisced, already missing the tropical heat of his homeland when a stray breeze slipped through the opening of his sleeve. The Fire Nation was still suburban, half agricultural—completely in contrast to the automobile dependent United Republic.

Passing by the outskirts of a well-groomed park, he noted several small plaques on the ground, names and years carved into the marble. Slowing his pace just a bit to read off the honorably mentioned people, he tried to see if he could recognize any people and stopped upon reaching the last stone.

AANG FENG  
MAYOR OF REPUBLIC CITY  
(2010- )

A smile sketched over his face. Of course, he would expect no less from Aang. Aang had always been the non-violent and peaceful negotiator, someone who had always been able to make conflicting sides come to a truce. Clearly, Aang was still making people come to terms with each other, and solving large municipal issues. He had always been the special one in their friend group: hard-working, self-determined, full of ideas as well as the energy to carry out his dreams.

Zuko pulled the slip of paper where he had scrawled an address down. Checking that he was on the right street and walking in the right direction, he pulled up his sleeve and quickly glanced over his watch.

Upon reaching the designated house, he rapped on the door three times, shifting his weight so that his stance was casual.

A pause, a few clicks, and an open door after, he was greeted by two—no, three—cheerful faces.

Zuko knelt down to wave a hello to the unfamiliar face. "And how old is she?" he asked the proud parents.

"Just turned two about a week ago," Aang replied, and encouraged Zuko to stand back up with a beckoning hand. "Come on, aren't you interested in your old friends? We haven't seen each other in ten years!" Once Zuko was up, Aang brought him into a tight embrace. "Still rocking that hair, but you've changed so much, bro."

"I have to say the same for you, man," the older male said, and looked over his companion's head. "Losing some hairs on the top of your head already?" And he tussled Aang's softly balding scalp.

"He combs some hair over the spot to retain his ego," Aang's wife chuckled, before taking her turn in hugging their visitor.

"Ah, Katara…" Zuko greeted, before taking a step back to look at her. "You actually haven't changed at all—save this bump," he remarked, putting his hands back into his pockets and noting the sizable roundness of Katara's stomach. He looked back up at her face. "Still with those hair loopies,"he mocked with a soft smile, using his fingers to twirl the air around his temples.

She sighed, rolling her eyes, before slapping one of his arms down. "They aren't hair loopies," she murmured, her eyes smiling with the nostalgia.

And when he saw those crystal cerulean eyes, he was suddenly struck by the real reason why he was there in the first place.

...

_After three rings, the other end picked up the line._

"_Hi," answered a familiar voice. "Who is this?"_

"_Hey Aang. It's Zuko."_

"_Zuko? Oh man, I haven't heard from you in forever! How's life been treating you?"_

"_Awesomely. I was thinking of visiting—"_

"_Yeah! You should definitely stop by! I might be busy but I still want to see you in person. I'm living in Republic City now."_

"_Ah, reminds me of college."_

"_Let me get you the address."_

"_Sure," Zuko said, and then waited, but something crossed his mind. "And you're still with…Katara, right?"_

_..._

He hadn't realized it then, but it was those ocean eyes that pulled and pushed him everywhere, in the same manner as the tides themselves.

"Come in," Aang beckoned, and Zuko followed suit, closing the door behind him, careful to not trip over their two-year-old. He bent down once again to face the child. "So what's your name?" he inquired the little one.

"Her name's Kya," Katara replied, the love for her kid spilling out in her smooth voice.

"Hi Kya, you're such a pretty girl," Zuko said, tracing the contours of the girl's high cheekbones. She was sprouting waves of brown hair, in the shade of her mother's locks, and her eyes reflected the mahogany orbs of her father's countenance.

"So how has your company been?" asked Aang, giving him a chair at the dining table to sit down at, before taking a seat himself.

Zuko waved off the topic. "Oh it's been good. I got a few more patents out, but things haven't changed too—"

"That's impressive! Congratulations!" Katara blurted, taking her seat at the opposite end of Aang. It was clear that the family already had their special seats. Zuko was sitting in a chair that didn't match the style of the other three; they had probably had to drag this chair from the living room or something in order to allow him to fit around their dinner table.

"Yeah, for real," Aang scoffed. "What's the 'things haven't changed' all about? You've obviously been doing some good work since we last saw you."

"It's really nothing," Zuko replied, trying to brush off the compliments. "Well what about you, _Mayor _of Republic City?"

The mayor and his wife laughed. "Where'd you hear that?" he asked.

"Read it on a rock on my way here. Ah, that's right—I have a gift for you guys." Zuko pulled out the wrapped gift that he had just recently bought in a shop along the street. "Just an assortment of traditional dried fruit."

"Oh Zuko, you didn't have to be so formal with the visit,"Katara said, standing to take the platter and putting it aside on the kitchen counter to the side of them before returning to her seat. Bringing dried fruit delicacies was customary for visitors to bring to the table in the United Republic, an edible symbol of the newly ripened fruit of freedom and democracy the nation stood for.

"But yes, I've been the mayor of this city for about two years now."

"Must be a lot of work."

"It _is_. Aang is barely ever home."

"Well, I try to be home as much as I can. Katara's taken a leave from the hospital until the next rascal starts running around and I've been trying to support the expenses for diapers and such."

Right, Katara became a nurse. She would, being the caring and selfless person that she was.

"Actually, I have to catch a flight later tonight to meet the councilmembers in the northern part of the country," explained Aang. "But I figured that I should at least see you in person and stick around for dinner so that I could eat some home-cooked food before I leave for good."

"Ah." Zuko couldn't remember the last meal he ate.

"I wanted to spend some more time with you, but since you'll be here touring the city for the week, I figured I could see you in two days' time when I'm back from the conference," Aang continued. But then younger man changed the subject. "What about you—tell us more about what you've been up to in the Fire Nation."

"Well, like I said, nothing has really changed. I'm still living in the same place—"

"You mean, you're still living in that small house?" Katara asked him.

"Yeah…it's okay, I don't need that much space. I mean, it's just me, myself, and I living there—"

"You're not married yet?" Aang exclaimed. "Man, you're like…what, 36?"

"Why not?" his wife asked, her eyebrows slightly furrowed.

Looking up at Aang, then shifting his gaze to Katara, he replied, with a small smile, "I guess…I just haven't found the one."

"Get settled soon! Your prime time's fading off!" Aang encouraged, patting Zuko's shoulder. "Don't want those bad-at-telling-jokes genes to go to waste! Do you have a girlfriend, though?"

Zuko opened his mouth but Katara did him a favor and scolded Aang. "Don't give him a hard time; some things take time. Anyway…" and she took a second look at his jacket. "Oh, you're still wearing this jacket, Zuko?"

The singleton, surprised himself, looked down at his jacket—black, heavy fabric, zip-up. He actually hadn't noticed it himself, but coincidentally, this was the very jacket he was wearing the last time he saw the two of them. He hadn't worn it ever since, and wasn't sure what had compelled him to wear this one jacket before he left for Republic City.

"It doesn't get too cold in the Fire Nation," he explained briefly, slowly sliding his hands back into his pockets, unconsciously defending the jacket. "I, um, actually haven't worn this since the last time I saw you guys."

As his hands retreated into his warm pockets, his left hand came across the folded sheet of notepaper that had the couple's home address written on it. He made a quick mental note to throw this out later; he wasn't going to be needing it. His other hand, however, discovered that there was something in his right pocket that he hadn't noticed earlier before. Reaching deeper into the fabric, he came across a cold hard small cubic container.

That was still there?

...

_He slowly rotated the warm case in his right hand, with a growing smile creeping across his face—one that he couldn't keep from hiding. Geez, he couldn't contain his excitement; his legs were restless and the airplane's small cramped space—and he had a window seat!—wasn't helping his impatience. Checking his watch once again, he let out a big sigh and leaned back into his seat._

"_Excited to land? You've checked that watch at least twenty times within the past two hours."_

_Zuko turned his head to the left, seeing an older man, perhaps in his thirties._

"_Yeah," he replied, softly laughing. "I have someone special waiting for me."_

"_Your girl, I guess?"_

"_You could say that."_

"_You young ones amuse me so much," commented his neighbor. "Full of youth and love. I'm guessing you guys aren't married yet. Or if not, just newly married. Don't worry; you guys will get sick of each other soon."_

_Zuko gave out a rich laugh. "Actually, I'm going to ask her for her hand when I land."_

"_Ah?" and the older man's eyebrows raised. "Well you're at that age…mid-20's, I'm guessing. No wonder you're so fidgety. Is it an expensive ring?"_

"_Relatively."_

"_Beautiful beyond imagination?"_

"_Nothing more than her."_

"_Well then it's settled," concluded the older one. "She can't say no."_

_Another laugh from Zuko._

"_I wish you the best of luck and fortune, then. You have a long way ahead of you."_

_Zuko looked back down at his watch. A few minutes before the intended arrival time. He hoped to hell that the flight wasn't going to be extremely late. Looking out the airplane window, he saw that the plane had actually dropped in altitude a few thousand miles. Not able to help himself, he glanced down at his watch once more._

"_Don't worry, the plane can't stay in the air forever," chuckled the older man._

"_She actually gave me this watch before I left," Zuko added, a nostalgic smile on his face._

_..._

"Oh that's right," Aang said. "You probably haven't even needed to use it—the weather in the Fire Nation is so hot and humid. Katara and I were planning to take a vacation to one of the beaches there when it got to around to the dead of winter here. Of course, she doesn't quite fit into a bikini right now—"

"Shut up," she said, giving her husband a playful slap on the hand. "Let me get out the plates so we can start eating—don't want to make you miss this flight."

...

_He could barely contain his heart as he made his way down from the airplane through the walkway to the terminal, dragging his suitcase noisily behind him._

_He found her, waiting for him, her hands clasped and impatient herself._

"_Zuko!" she exclaimed and came running towards him, embracing him tightly._

"_Hey…" he greeted, and even though he thought his beating heart couldn't thump any harder, he still found his chest fluttering even faster, the blood rushing up to his head. God, she was so beautiful. His arm let his suitcase down and he returned the hug, his nose in her hair, smelling the sweet sweet fragrance that he had missed for those years that he had been travelling abroad._

"_I have good news," she announced, lifting her head._

"_Me too," he replied, biting down on his tongue to keep himself from blurting anything too prematurely. "You first."_

"_Aang and I are getting married next week!"_

_Something dropped in his stomach, and he lost his senses for a moment._

"_Oh, wow. Congratulations," he said, stepping backwards one._

"_Yes! We've planned so much for this and we're hoping you can come! I'm so glad you came back in time for all of this! You can make it right? It's going to be next Friday—we're tried to pick a good time for everyone!"_

"_Oh yeah. Of course," he nodded stiffly._

"_And it's about time, too! We've both been so caught up in our careers that we couldn't even think about the future for a long while!"_

"_I'm so happy for you, Katara," he said, swallowing back a sudden hard choke in his throat while using his thumb to push a box down as far down deep as he could into his pocket._

* * *

**Lol, actually after having written up to this part of the story, I'm thinking that I'm actually going to divide what was going to be a very long first chapter into smaller installments.**

**So some story credits: this story was half inspired by Just a Dream sung by Sam Tsui and Christina Grimmie—if you don't know it, please do go ahead to Youtube and look it up! I might plan to make a Zutara music video with that song in the background (unrelated to this story) but I'm worse at making videos than I am at writing, so I don't think anything is going to come out of that effort. **

**Anyways, I'm excited to hear what you guys think of the story so far! I hope you guys aren't completely confused about the AU world I've created! What do you think's going to happen next?**

**thir13enth**


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you so much my good readers—you have convinced me that I'm doing at least one thing right in the world (writing Zutara)!**

**Which reminds me that I should start preparing for Zutara week :3!**

**And also...with this chapter, I now have over 300K words written as an author! Yay...and I've been on fanfiction since little more than 7 years ago...ohhh damn, I am old...**

* * *

"Alright, Zuko, here's where I have to leave you," Aang announced, getting up from his seat, having finished the last of his meal. "I have to leave, so I'll see you in a few days, I guess. Have fun while you're here—you can go ahead and use my car if you need to tour the city and everything. Katara knows all the good places to see and eat at so that shouldn't be a problem either. And I'm sure Sokka and Suki will be excited to know you're in town. Toph and her man, too."

Zuko stood after Aang and the two good friends gave each other a parting hug before Aang walked over to get his briefcase and start to head out the door.

"Ohh, wait," Katara said, and she quickly ran over to the closet by the front door and fetched a beanie from in there. "It must be cold up there in the north part of the country this month. We wouldn't want your bald spot getting chilly, would we? You might lose some more hair!"

"It's just October, Katara," Aang assured, but let his wife place the beanie snug around his head before she patted his ears. He gave her a quick kiss. "Thanks for the delicious meal. Maybe it was just that Zuko was coming over or something, but that curry was much better than this entire week's food."

She snorted softly and elbowed him. "So that you come home quicker for more food," she replied.

"Ah, don't worry, I'll be back." Aang looked down at his daughter. "Bye Kya! I'll see you later, okay?"

His daughter responded with a wave and a high pitched, "Bye Daddy!"

"We'll catch up in a bit, Zuko!" Aang promised, waving to him, but something fell off his wrist, and Aang mumbled a curse. "Ack, my watch," he said, picking it up from the ground. "Well you've served well for the time that you weren't broken."

"Here," and Katara took off her own watch and fastened it onto Aang's wrist. "Don't be late for this flight! We don't want the same thing that happened last time where you were waiting on stand-by while everyone was waiting on you!"

"Alright, bye everyone!" and the door shut behind him.

Katara turned back towards the dining table and Zuko quickly came up with something to do.

"I'll help you clean the dishes," he suggested, rolling up his sleeves and getting up. He had done that a bit too quickly however, and a sudden sharp ache jabbed at his lower spine. He grimaced silently and gripped the end of his chair, waiting for a second before standing at his full height.

Katara was perceptive, however. "Is something wrong? Are you okay?"

"Nah, I'm good. I've just recently developed some back pain," Zuko explained, gently pushing her hand away. He gathered up the dirty plates and utensils, heading over to the sink.

"Well thank you so much for helping. I'll get you something for that pain later."

"No, it's totally fine. Don't worry about it."

"Well how long have you been experiencing that pain?"

…

_He had been sitting in this hard wood pew seat forever, but he kept himself occupied by taking a look at everything around him, including all the intricate decorations set up, the rest of the wedding guests, and especially the couple themselves. _

_He assumed that the two of them had chosen to hold the wedding in this church because it was the larger of the churches that were in Republic City, which was still developing at this time. The wedding had to be here, in Republic City, because this was the very city where they had all met each other, attending Republic City University._

_It had been many minutes since she had walked down the aisle, Aang at her side, but Zuko was still amazed at simply how beautiful she looked in that wedding dress. _

_Zuko needed to stretch a bit, so he arched his back forward a bit, but a sudden ache hit him, and he almost doubled over but kept his groan to himself._

"_Hey, you okay?" whispered Sokka, who was to the right of Zuko. Zuko was sitting in the family section of the seating arrangements, which he was honored to be considered part of, even though he had technically only known them since the beginning of their undergraduate years. _

_Zuko had been a sophomore when he had met Sokka, who came in the year after him at the university, and the two of them had meet as members of the same varsity volleyball team. Becoming close friends, Sokka later introduced his sister, Katara, to Zuko. Katara matriculated into Republic City University when Zuko was a junior but despite their class difference, they all hung out quite a bit, especially after Sokka got into a relationship with Suki, who was one of Katara's best friends. Aang and Toph had gotten to know their friend circle by chance, being freshmen when the rest of them were upperclassmen, but they were soon a regular part of their hangouts and the circle wasn't ever complete without the two included. _

_Zuko had decided to co-term in computer science after having taken a lot of classes in programming alongside his bioengineering major. This way he was also able to spend more time with his age-diverse friend group before he eventually decided to carry out his own work abroad travels, thinking it was better to get some experience and venture the rest of the world before he settled down and got a permanent job._

_He had originally had plans, but since last week, he hadn't had the time to rethink about what he wanted to do in the future. Although he evidently had the time to consider it all now, he was a bit too distracted and thought it disrespectful during Aang and Katara's wedding anyway, an event that would undoubtedly change their futures._

"_Yeah, I'm good. Just been sitting in this seat for too long," Zuko replied to Sokka._

"_For real, they just had to choose the church with the worst seats!"_

_Zuko laughed quietly, reaching back behind his black jacket to massage his lower back._

…

"It's only been hurting just a while ago, it's nothing big."

"Sorry for asking," she excused herself. "It's just a habit, being a nurse and all. But seriously, if you need some aspirin or something for that pain, let me know. I have a lot of over the counter things, especially with this one coming up." She paused to rub her hand over her belly.

Zuko didn't look up from the sink. "When are you expecting?"

"Next month, actually."

"That's soon," he replied. "You should go take a rest."

"I'll do that once Kya is down in bed. It's getting harder to get her to sleep nowadays."

He felt a small tug at his pants and glanced down to see the aforementioned child looking up at him with a curious gaze.

"Kya, don't bother him. He's doing the dishes for us."

"What's name?" she asked loudly.

Not able to help the smile that formed on his face, he quickly set the rest of the wet dishes onto the drying rack and got down to the two-year-old's level. "Zuko," he answered, and pointing at her, asked, "What's _your _name?"

"Kya!" she exclaimed delightfully.

"And how old is Kya?"

She held out two of the smallest fingers he had ever seen.

"Oh? Want to count them? One…two," he said, tapping her two fingers as he did this. "Kya is two years old? Wow, you're growing up so quickly!"

"You call him, Uncle Zuko, okay?" Katara said, bending down slightly, her teeth flashing in her proud smile. "Mommy's known Uncle Zuko for a very long time."

Zuko was taken aback by Katara's smile, and for a moment was frozen, looking at the way her hair, some of it having escaped her hairtie, framed her flushed face. Her cerulean eyes lighted, the reflection of her daughter flashing across those beautifully shaded irises. He averted his momentary gaze and distracted himself.

"Does Kya want to be taller than Mommy?" he asked, a mischievous glint in his eye.

Taking Kya's widened eyes and short nod for a confirmation, Zuko then swiftly picked the girl up and perched her on top of his shoulders. His back complained for a second, a stab at that spot on his lower back, but he ignored it when hearing Kya's tinkling laughter right above his head, her hands tugging at his hair to hold on.

"Come on, to your room we go!" he declared, making dramatically large and swooping steps out of the kitchen to elicit more laughter out of the girl. He looked back at Katara, who was covering her smiling mouth and pointing in the direction that he should go. He intuitively figured out the rest of it and then sat down on Kya's bed. Kya lightly slapped his face, cheering for "Uncle Zuko" to keep going. Seeing Katara at the door, he gave her a hand motion that told her that he'd take care of all the rest for the night.

She gave him a warm smile and then disappeared.

Zuko plucked Kya off his shoulders and plopped her onto her mattress, where she immediately put her head on the pillow and snuggled herself up under the covers. Zuko got up from her bed and squatted at her bedside, placing his face close to Kya's.

"You know, you didn't brush your teeth yet," he accused the girl, who put a finger to her mouth in a silent shush.

"Tell me story," she insisted instead.

"Hm," he mused as he looked behind him for inspiration. "What about…ah, _The Legend of Korra_?"

"That one long."

"Yeah, I agree," Zuko said, re-shelving the book. "What about—"

"Your story!"

"_My _story?"

"Your story!"

"My story's boring."

"Your story!"

He smiled. "Okay, I have a mother, a father, and a younger sister. And one day, we went to the beach together. Just the four of us."

_And shit, I'm already running out of things to say, _he thought. He wasn't sure why he picked his family as a topic. Ah well, he'd make the rest of it up.

"My sister and I wanted to build sand castles. My sister wanted to make the biggest strongest one and she had a huge pail and a shovel to make her castle. She wanted to race with me to make a castle. My father counted down 'three, two , one!' and off we went to make our castles. I didn't have a pail, so I just used my slushie cup that I had just finished drinking—"

"What kind slushie!"

Zuko ran a list of fruits through his head. "A mango pineapple one," he came up with.

"And strawberry?"

"Yes."

"And apple?"

"Yes."

"Wow! I want _that_ slushie!"

"It does sound delicious, doesn't it," he remarked. "And then we finished making our castles when time was up. My dad said that my sister's castle was better and then my sister called herself the Fire Lord of the castle. Okay, the end. Time to go to sleep."

"But I no want to go to sleep," she pouted, her lower lip sticking out.

"Do you love Mommy? If you love Mommy, you should go to sleep."

"I love Mommy," she affirmed. "Do _you _love Mommy?"

He paused for a moment but returned a silent laugh. "Yeah, I love her, too."

"Then _you _go sleep too!"

"I will, I will," he promised. "Good night, Kya."

"Good night, Uncle Zu…zu…?"

He smiled to himself. He had thought he was done with that nickname when he moved away from his family for good after graduating from college.

Zuko stepped over to where he had previously left his suitcase, and quickly dragged it over by the couch, where he assumed he was going to be sleeping for the night, since the only other bedroom was the master room. Taking off his jacket, he stepped over to the coat rack, but right before hanging his jacket, he thought it was better if he just left it together with his suitcase. He wasn't going to be intrusive in their home.

Leaning over and sitting down on the sofa, he reached his aching back with his arm and slowly straightened his back, feeling the stiff tension in his muscles at the lower part of his spine. He then got up and cracked his back before settling back into the cushions.

"That was a record time to get her down to sleep. What's your secret?"

He looked up to see Katara entering the living room. She took a seat down slowly next to him, holding her belly.

"I told her about my life," he replied. "That gets everyone asleep."

She laughed. "That's not true. It's just in the way you present it."

"Oh well, thanks."

Their laughter slowly faded into quiet. They let the silence take over for a moment, before Katara remarked, "You know, Zuko, you haven't contacted us after all this time except for that one call last month when Aang suggested you come by to visit. Been too busy?"

"You could say that."

"We all thought you fell off the face of the planet or something. We tried calling you, but you had changed your number or something."

"Yeah, I just changed phone plans and decided to switch numbers too. I, um, guess I didn't tell you guys."

"We were worried about you; _I _was worried you. Thought we'd never ever hear from you again, especially after you moved all the way to the Fire Nation! Everyone else is here in Republic City—we were surprised that you went back to the Fire Nation, especially since it was so fun here during undergrad."

Zuko didn't respond immediately. "I thought it'd be better for me," he said when he finally sorted out his thoughts. "I can barely handle the cold up here."

"Well, I've missed you for sure. I thought we were going to have time to hang out after you decided to go off and venture through the world and what not, but right after our wedding, you told us you were going to be moving!"

…

_He woke up to the sound of his shrieking cell phone._

What the hell…_he thought when he abruptly got up, his eyes squinting at the bright sunset that peeked through his windows. He concluded that he must have fallen asleep and had been passed out for nearly an hour. Hearing that his phone was still unanswered, he got back on his feet and groaned upon feeling an ache in his lower back._

_That damn pain was still there from yesterday at the wedding? But he dismissed it and headed over across his studio apartment to reach his phone, which had been deposited on his kitchen counter. He didn't recognize the number flashing on the caller ID screen._

"_Hello," he said, rather unenthusiastically._

"_Hi, is this Zuko Kaji?"_

"_Yes, who is this?"_

"_Oh, I'm Yin Long. I'm the real estate agent for the house on Orchard Street. You had mentioned you were interested in a two or three bedroom house—"_

"_Ah, right," he said. "Actually, I'm no longer looking for a place that size. Perhaps smaller is more suited for me right now."_

"_I see. Well, I actually don't have any smaller homes in my listings…"_

"_That's okay. Thanks so much for your business."_

…

"Yeah, sorry about that," he apologized. He was looking down at the carpet, but could see from the corner of his eye that her face suddenly turned directly towards him.

"Hey Zuko?" she asked softly, placing a hand on his shoulder. He turned to face her, his shoulder retracting from her touch. Her eyebrows furrowed as she tried to make eye contact with him. "You haven't seemed yourself. Is it your back pain? Or maybe you're tired?" She studied his eyes again, and this time around, she caught his gaze once. "You look dreadfully exhausted."

"Must be the jet lag."

"How about you take the bed tonight? I know your back still hurts because you're horrible at lying," she suggested, smiling.

Zuko looked at her, not quite believing what she had just said. "But you definitely need it because…" and he motioned towards her stomach.

"Oh…well then we'll just share the bed." Still seeing his unbelieving, and perhaps slightly horrified, look, she continued, "It's not a big deal. We both need a good place to rest tonight and Kya's bed is much too short and small to be shared with anyone our size." She got up and motioned him to do the same.

"I'll be fine on the couch. I really don't need the bed."

"Ay, don't be stubborn," Katara argued. "I know what's better for your back than you do. Besides, we've shared beds before, and I can trust you not to kick me off. It'll be nostalgic."

…

_A soft knock on his door._

"_What's up?" he answered in a raised voice, not bothering to lower the volume of his music. He already knew who it was._

_The door opened—he normally kept his room unlocked now these days—and in came a familiar face._

"_Hey Zuko, what's up?"_

"_Nothing, just chilling. What about you?" he stopped typing for a second to face his visitor._

"_Was hanging out with Suki before Sokka interrupted us."_

"_Out so late? Again?" he asked sarcastically. "It's like two in the morning."_

"_Yeah again," Katara said, joining him on his mattress. "And as always, I always end up here. The only other person in this dorm that I know is Suki, and their room is off-limits because Sokka's there with her. So…of course, I'd end up here. Don't act so surprised."_

"_Your dorm is really not that far from here," he replied._

"_It's _snowing _out there, Zuko."_

"_Be a man."_

"_That's impossible for me," she retorted. "And you never seem to mind whenever I come by."_

"_Which happens to be practically every night. Your roommate probably wonders where the hell you sleep. I mean, fuck, your toothpaste and toothbrush has been in this room since the beginning of the year when you first decided to exploit me."_

"_Well, what's the big problem tonight?"Katara asked. "What's all the fuss about for today?"_

_Zuko let the argument go. "Nothing—I just hope you don't mind since I'll be up for a while writing my senior thesis. I'm on a roll here. Wrote five legit pages so far."_

"_Nah, I can sleep with the light on," she said. There came a lapse in their conversation._

_He knew that through her silence, she was demanding that he get off his bed so that she could sleep on it, but he didn't do it, waiting for her to ask in voice._

_She waited for a whole minute, while he typed away another paragraph for his paper. After a while, however, she started to push him slowly, but he didn't budge. Finally, after a few more minutes, she commanded, "Get off the bed. I need to sleep."_

"_You're pushing me off my own bed?" he asked, but it came out more like a statement._

"_Yes."_

_He faked an exasperated sigh and rolled over to his desk, where he continued to pump out more words onto his Word document._

_She curled up under his blanket and rested her head on one side of his pillow, placing her body towards the side of his bed closer to the wall. By this point, it was practically normal to have an extra body on his bed, and they had nonverbally determined that she would sleep on the inside of the bed, since he was usually the one to sleep later, and the one to wake up earlier too._

_Following a few minutes, she added, "Actually, just one thing. Can you tune down the music?"_

"_Wait for the drum solo to finish," he replied, and then air-drummed along in beat to the drummer rifting over the speakers. When finished, he closed his eyes in the conclusive beauty of the measure. "Awww, yeah, that was epic. Gets me every single time I play this song."_

"_Alright, it's over. Now let me sleep."_

"_Okay, okay, geez."_

_After a few hours, he heard a soft snore emerge from her direction. He couldn't help but smile. _

_That was too precious._

…

"Why don't you make yourself comfortable, hm?"

"What do you mean?"

She made a hand motion that made him look at himself. "You're practically completely dressed. You can sleep in jeans?"

"Yeah, I'm good. Sorta too tired to change," he excused, trying to rationalize this decision that he was making. It felt too wrong to be taking what seemed like Aang's rightful place. Zuko wasn't part of this family's picture, why the hell was he up here?

But since he was already in the situation, he calmed himself down. It was just going to be eight hours of sleeping at most. Probably less because he'd wake up after four or five hours because of the uncomfortable situation. Also, for those hours, he'd be unconscious. It'd be okay. And Katara invited him. He didn't invite himself. Aang wouldn't mind. Aang trusted him.

"Alright," she said, choosing not to bother him again. She sat down on the mattress before slowly lowering herself onto her bed so that she was sleeping on her side.

He got onto the bed on the opposite side of the bed. Her back faced him, and while he waited for himself to fall asleep he asked himself over and over why the hell he ever let her persuade him to sleep on the same bed as her. He really didn't need it and if anything…it was just worse for him to be doing so.

Under the moonlight, he couldn't help but notice her untied hair splayed out across her pillow…

_What the hell am I thinking? I shouldn't be thinking about this, _he scolded himself, turning over to face the other direction. At least this mattress was considerably larger than the ones in the college dormitories. He closed his eyes, pressing his face into the pillow to rid himself of any thoughts besides those of sleep.

Shit. The pillows were covered with her scent. Her sweet sweet fragrance.

The last time he had smelled this—breathed her in—was that time that she had escaped from his arms forever.

* * *

**I hope everything still makes sense! I keep adding more and more random AU details in! -_- And oh, yes, their last names are essentially their elements but in other Asian languages, namely Chinese and Japanese. I just didn't see the possibility of a foreign sounding name with an English one: Aang Wind? Zuko Fire? Nah. Asian-fying makes lots of things better.**

**Drop a delightful review for me? They keep me writing! (And feel free to skip the next part)**

**Random Author Rant****—though who gives about what the author has to say besides the story, right?**

**So I've suddenly realized in a good amount of the anime things that I watch, that there are some commonalities in the male characters that I favor:**

**Zuko (who doesn't love this kid!)**

**Mako (well okay, I have a soft spot because he's named in honor of the original voice actor of Iroh before he passed, but in addition to that, out of the first few characters in Legend of Korra that I've encountered, he's pretty chill—except that he's totally playing Asami, I mean, what the hell, that poor girl!)**

**Mustang (from FullMetal Alchemist; well for one thing, I just love Riza—therefore I love her other half xD, insert shameless Royai plug! And Mustang's pretty awesome as himself too, I must admit)**

**Sasuke (from Naruto; haters gon' hate and as much as that kid was—still, is—angsty, he was cool and stuff. And he's sorta annoying right now because he just increases the amount of hatred he has each time he gets poked by a splinter or something, but I'm still nostalgic for those good old times when Team Kakashi was all together—and Kakashi is plain awesome, no debate about that)**

**Hei (from Darker than Black; you probably don't know this show, but you should. It's that mature, dark, noir, alternate mindfuck universe that when you're done with the total of 40 episodes, you just are knocked out for two days in the beauty of the plot and just WANT MORE but the show is no longer in running, wtf! Give this show a chance! And if you decide to watch it, LET ME KNOW I love to talk about this show! Anyway, Hei is just amazing, there's no way that you can hate him)**

**So there are the five—what's the commonality? Well there's two: **

**One, they have black hair. **

**Two, they are all fire/lightning related. (What are the odds?)**

**In conclusion, I should find my soulmate in a black-haired flamethrower. I don't know if this is upsetting or not… **

**Alright, rant over—thir13enth out. Review? :3 Review for the cat-face?**


	3. Chapter 3

**Thank you to my readers, and I want to shout out to one in particular: NarniaMagicLOTRDisneyLove—but because I CAN'T PM HER TO REPLY TO HER REVIEW! Rawr! Therefore, I will reply to her right here: Thank you so much for the ongoing support! And haha! Yes! This story is depressing and I do love writing it that way very much—mua ha! As for how this all works out, I'll let the story narrate that all, but I hope that since all the flashbacks aren't chronological, that it all still makes sense. Actually, since I technically do have the story all written out already, I can say that there's one subtle detail that basically brings everything together in another future chapter and I should probably highlight it a bit more…anyway, thank you so much for the kind words!**

**I guess I do want to explain myself a bit though—I have two different types of dividers in the story, the ellipses and the 'divider'. The ellipses were originally not going to be there and was supposed to be more like 'the present moment weaves into a memory of a flashback' and all that, and dividers actually signify that time has elapsed. But later, I glanced over the actual documents as they appeared on the document manager and figured that italics and print would be easier to differentiate if I had a marker between them—thus the ellipses. Especially since this story is time-sensitive, at least in my opinion, I didn't want any misunderstandings about the time and the story and the timeline of it all. Perhaps I'll make a conclusive one at the end of this fanfiction just for closure or something. :)**

**Anyways, enjoy:**

* * *

"Look Zuko, a boy!"

He whipped his head around, seeing Katara cradling her newborn in her arms on the hospital bed. Running over to her bedside, he took in the sheer beauty of her and her baby together.

"Ah, he's so handsome and healthy," he complimented. Katara lifted her baby up, encouraging Zuko to pick him up as well. He did just that, lifting the baby's fair face up to him, noting the black hair sprouting from the top of his head. "Hey little guy," he cooed and then was surprised to see the baby's eyelids flutter open.

Two honey-gold amber irises returned his gaze.

"What beautiful eyes…" he said, half-entranced in the baby's eyes, seeing his own reflection cast in the infant's pupils.

"What should we call him?"

Zuko was taken aback and looked up. "We?"

But then he realized she was talking to Aang, who was sitting at the bedside aside her, one of her hands clasped between his two protective hands. Aang kissed her fingers and suggested, "I was thinking…Bumi, because he's one of my very old friends. Literally."

That evoked a laugh from the mother.

_What am I doing here? _Zuko thought and then looked back down at the baby in his arms.

Two dark mahogany eyes greeted him—

"Shit," he cursed softly, jolting awake.

_Where am I? What am I doing? _He asked himself, checking his surroundings. Feeling the sheets under his tense grasp and smelling Katara, he quickly reminded himself that he was on her bed, _their _bed.

Sleeping on the same mattress? This was a horrible idea. He would have never gotten sleep like this.

Sitting upright, he rubbed his eyes, but briefly saw the honey-gold amber eyes…

_It was just a dream._ _Just a fucking dream._

His breathing slowly regulated, as he held his breath, and he slowly got up off the mattress and went to the bathroom, silently closing the door and flipping the light switch on. The bright lights made him squint, but each time his eyes shut, he saw those golden eyes on the baby.

_His _color eyes on _their _child. What the hell was he thinking?

Turning on the faucet, he splashed cold water onto his face, trying to wash out the image of his head, clear the thoughts from his mind…

"Zuko?"

He stopped, turned off the faucet, wiped his face on the nearest hand towel.

"Zuko, are you okay?"

"Sorry," he mumbled. "I must have woken you up."

"That's okay. Is it your back that is hurting?" she reached over to touch his lower back.

He retaliated, slapping her hand off him. "No, stop it," he demanded harshly.

But then he looked back at her, catching her widened eyes. He thought he saw his face briefly in them, recognizing his own furrowed eyebrows and half-bared teeth in her ocean-tinted orbs. He instantly retracted from his tense position, shamefully covering his eyes with one hand while he took a deep breath in, his posture loosening. "Oh geez, I'm sorry," he apologized, "I just…it's just my back; I'm not mad—it's not you."

…

"_Ow! Zuko! You're pulling my wrist out of its socket! How much longer is it going to be until we get there?" Katara asked, her outstretched left hand tightly grasping his right hand._

"_Just another minute," he replied, leading her through the brush. "Oh, watch it there—there's a root sticking out of the ground," he warned and caught her by the waist when she half-tripped over mentioned root. _

"_Oof! Where are we anyway?"_

"_You idiot, that's the whole surprise," he reminded her. He removed some branches out of the way and led her through the remaining forestry before they reached a clear grassy plain. He slowed his pace, having her take a few steps forward before facing her._

_He held her face in his hands, raising her jaw up. He brushed off a few strands of unruly hair from her face, tucking it behind her ear. He froze a moment, realizing that her warm caramel mocha skin was right under his fingers, his thumbs inches from the corners of her flush lips. Her lips partly opened at that moment, and he was entranced by the way her lips stuck together for a second before they actually separated. His own head was bowed down, and he was close enough to feel her cool breath on his face._

_He could just kiss her. Right then and there._

"_Hey Zuko?" she asked, her hands patting his chest and slowly moving upwards. "Are we there?"_

"_Yep," he answered softly, and then reached behind her head to untie the handkerchief that he had tied around her eyes. The blindfold slipped off her eyes, and her long eyelashes parted._

_He was frozen again, seeing the brilliance of her eyes, an indescribable shade of blue. He wasn't sure whether to insult it by calling it sapphire, or whether to just arbitrarily call it ocean. Each time he saw her eyes, he revised and changed what he thought the color was, but her eyes were never quite the same, and he was never quite able to place a name to the shade._

_At this distance, all he saw in her eyes were his own eyelashes. _

"_Um," he interrupted his own thoughts and then let go of her, pulling away from her hands and moving so that she could see the scenery that he had brought her to._

"_Oh, this is beautiful!" she exclaimed, her eyes smiling and her hands covering her gaping mouth. "Just so beautiful!"_

_He bit down a smile and looked at the landscape himself._

_The edge of a cliff. Across from where they stood, ground at the same height covered in lush floral-scented grass with brush towards the back. Below them several hundred feet, a melodic blue river that came out of a waterfall that was hidden in the curve of the land towards the right of them. A roar emerged from water, one that accompanied the orchestra of the chirping and squealing of the wildlife around them. The sun came down in speckles, punching through the broad leaves of the tall deciduous trees that grew directly above them._

"_How…when did you find this place?"_

"_I was exploring Republic City before coming to our orientation. I rented a car and was just driving around taking random exits."_

"_That's amazing!"_

"_And I guess I had gotten lost too."_

"_What is this place anyway?"_

"_There's an opening in the fence in one of the north nature reserves. Some huge animal must have been trying to find a shortcut or something."_

_She lay down on her stomach and crept closer to the edge of the cliff. He found himself following in her actions, though his hand was ready, next to her, in the case that she accidentally slipped. He gazed a while at the scenery around them but each time found himself drawn back to her face, which was still enlightened with awe._

"_So all this time you knew this place existed and you didn't show me?" she asked him, turning to face him, a toothy grin dusted across her cheeks. "And now the week before you co-term graduate you show me?"_

_He gave her the best shrug he could while lying flat on his belly, making a musical I-don't-know grunt. "Never crossed my mind."_

"_Have you shown anyone else this place?"_

_He already knew the answer: just her, but he faked a moment of thought, his eyes rolling up as though he were counting people in his head. "No, actually. Just you," he concluded._

"_Hm," she replied, "Well this place is gorgeous. Thank you for taking me here—even though it took hours to get here."_

"_Little less than one. It felt like more because you were blindfolded."_

_She didn't seem to hear what he had said, her eyes unfocused and staring at some unspecified location and her mouth tense, tight, and grim. After a second, she turned back to him, eyes with a tint of sad. "It's too bad that you're going to be gone for good after next week."_

"_What do you mean? I'm done with college!"_

"_You know what I mean," she said simply. "We're not going to be able to see you anymore. And then what, you're not even sticking around Republic City—you're going to do this random—what is it?—a tour around the world or something?"_

"_It's not a tour," he defended. "I'm legitimately going to be finding some temporary work positions around the different nations so that one, I get out of this college bubble, and two, so that I can see for myself what the world needs out there. Also, it's the perfect time for me to live like a nomad since I'll be chained down to a family and house in the future."_

"_You could just get some stable job around here. I don't know why you want to put yourself through that. And for how long are you going to be away anyway?"_

"_I don't know. Three, four years? Maybe more depending on if something changes my plans."_

"_That hardly sounds like a plan," she retorted. "And what do you mean, 'something changes my plan'?"_

"_A shitload of things can happen," he explained, trying to come up with something off the top of his head. "Like…I don't know, I could find myself really liking a certain city and just end up staying there."_

"_You mean like finding a girlfriend."_

_His mouth opened but no words came out for a second. "Perhaps," though he didn't tell her that that was probably the last thing that was going to happen. _

_Especially when he had already determined that she was the one._

_She laughed once or twice softly, slowly standing up. "Just promise me that you'll come back to visit us. Our hangouts will never be the same—who's going to be telling all the depressing and bad jokes when you're gone?"_

_A gentle snort as he got up to his own full height. "You guys will be just fine without me, I guarantee. After a while, you guys will barely notice that I'm gone."_

"_Well, _I'll _miss you," she affirmed._

_He didn't reply, shifting his gaze to the river down below. He still felt her eyes on him though._

"_Promise me that you'll keep in touch and take a lot of pictures for me. I know you're bad at that stuff but at least poke me back on Facebook when I poke you!"_

_He rolled his eyes. "Poking's just stupid."_

"_No it's not," she insisted, giving him a long hard poke, with a mischievous smile._

"_Don't make me push you off this cliff."_

"_You wouldn't dare," she challenged, her face coming threateningly close to his._

_Zuko raised an eyebrow and then gave her a hard shove._

_She screamed for the few inches that she fell backwards, desperately grabbing onto him, before his outstretched arm caught her and pulled her back._

"_Zuko, you _asshole_!" she yelled while punching his chest as he laughed. "Ugh! You jerk! I almost fell off! What the hell!"_

"_What do you mean?" he innocently asked. "I wouldn't _dare _to push you off."_

_She gave him a hard two-handed shove on his chest but remained in his tight embrace, eventually breaking out into relief laughter herself. "You're so mean," she murmured into his shirt._

"_Come, we should start heading back to campus," he said, releasing her from his arms and taking a few steps back towards the brush._

_She kept her arms around him, looking up at him. "You haven't promised yet."_

"_Promised what?"_

"_To keep me posted! Don't forget about me!"_

_His heart sank, but warm. When the hell was he going to tell her that she rarely left his mind?_

"_Ah, don't worry about it. I'll make sure to."_

"_Promise! Swear it on your mother's grave!"_

"_Oof, that's just rubbing it in my face, huh?"_

"_Promise!" she insisted._

"_Fine, I'll poke you back on Facebook," he assured._

_She gave out a sound of frustration, shoving him and started to head back towards the car through the trees._

"_I'll keep in touch; we'll still be together," he said, pulling her in by the shoulders so that their sides collided._

"_Good," she replied, one arm around his back._

**divider**

"Can we visit Uncle Sokka again?" Kya asked, hopping out of the car, while Zuko helped Katara get out of the passenger seat.

"Maybe next week," replied Katara, who thanked him quickly for his aid. "Let's quickly eat some dinner and then start to get to sleep, okay?"

Her daughter agreed with a joyous affirmation.

Upon reaching the kitchen, Katara opened the fridge and began to pull out some vegetables. Zuko noticed some meat defrosting in the sink and swiftly made his way over there. "Here, let me help you out with the cooking. What are you making?"

"Oh yeah, sure, thank you so much, Zuko," she said, pulling out a few more things from the refrigerator. "I'm just making a simple meat and vegetable broth for tonight."

"Okay, I'll take care of the pot and meat, and whatever vegetables you don't finish preparing."

She gave him a warm smile. "Thank you. I really really appreciate your help," she stated, watching him start to gracefully cut the meat into strips. "I don't usually get help cooking." Then she added with a laugh, "Aang tried once helping me once but failed miserably so he hasn't stepped foot in the kitchen since then. It seems that you know what you're doing, though."

He shook off her words. "Ah, it's really nothing."

"You'd be a much more helpful husband, wouldn't you?" she joked.

For a moment, he couldn't respond, but then laughed it off, "It comes with living alone, I guess."

It also seemed that Zuko was the single one out of the original friend group, as well. Sokka had married Suki only a bit before Aang and Katara had their wedding. Toph, though he hadn't seen her today when visiting Sokka and Suki, had apparently gotten married about three years after the rest of them. It was just Zuko alone now, and he still wasn't sure of what to do with himself.

_When I leave to go back home next week, _he determined. _I'm going to leave for good. _He had to leave his past plans and dreams behind. He'd go back to the Fire Nation and resculpt his life…

Even as he thought this, he still wasn't sure what was going to become of him. Could he move on? What would he do? Continue to work like he was for the past ten years? Go out and travel again like he had been before everything came crashing down on him?

And what the hell was he going to do with that ring stuck in his pocket?

Once the broth had finished forming, Katara threw in the remaining ingredients into the pot and smiled up at him.

"Sokka and Suki have definitely changed, haven't they?" she asked him.

Nodding, he replied, "But they're still together, going at it strong."

"I think it's really sweet how their romance started from all the way back then in college."

"Yeah."

Why hadn't he told her then? It was so stupid of him to have not let her know. He had made a mistake and his chance was gone; why was he still hanging on?

In her subsequent silence, he could tell that she thought she it was bad of her to bring up the couples subject and he hated that he was a source of that problem. What was wrong with him? Why couldn't he just recover and get a move on like everyone else does when they reach disappointment?

"I'm going to bring this down to a simmer," she said, tweaking the dial on the stove.

A couple of knocks from the front door.

"Ah," she exclaimed. "Toph probably heard you were in town."

She received the door, swinging it open to the uniform dressed man that stood outside.

"Katara Feng?"

Startled to see someone that she didn't recognize she answered hesitantly. "Yes?"

"There was an accident last night—a plane was caught in a larger storm up north and crash landed. I'm terribly sorry, but unfortunately, we identified your husband as one of the deceased."

* * *

**Oy, raidersfan777…looks like you were right.**

**thir13enth**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hm, well I do admit that the last part was sorta cliché, in my opinion. And suddenly, I realize that Tenzin would have never been born if Aang had passed away, which makes another AU detail…but alas, such is this twisted world of my own creation. And uh, I did do away with Agni and 'Spirits!' and replaced them with their modern counterparts—at least in English; I'm sure if I put them in Burmese, the idioms wouldn't fly.**

**But anyway, onwards with the story! Er, rather without the exclamation mark—this is a very sad moment in the story.**

* * *

She had been staring aimlessly at the night sky through the window in the dimly lit living room for the past three hours, her cheeks tear-streaked like that of the falling stars. No sound at all emerged from her, save her restrained and heavy breathing.

He sat on a couch to the side of her, in his own quiet remorse.

"At least she's not old enough to remember, huh? My daughter?"

He looked up to face her, his own eyes dry.

"I…I'm so sorry that your visit had to end up like…" her cracked voice trailed off, and her hand wiped off some fresh tears.

"No," and he cleared his throat from the ball in his throat. "This isn't something to apologize for."

"I just can't believe…I just can't believe this happened to him," she continued, sniffling. "I…and I was the one that told him to not miss that flight—"

"Don't say that, it's not your fault," he quickly interrupted and then got up to comfort Katara, who seemed to be relapsing back into a tearful breakdown. He got down onto his knees in front of her chair and held both her shoulders, shaking her lightly. "Hey," he said, and when she didn't respond, he placed his hands under her jaw and had her look up at him, supporting her heavy head. "It's not your fault, okay?"

"And our next child will never get to know him," she said, after a moment.

"You'll tell them all about what a wonderful man he was."

She shook her head. "It's not the same."

He had never seen her eyes so weary, in such despair, the blue of her eyes ocean deep. He couldn't bear to see them so transparent and he caught the misery that grew from the windows of her soul just by looking in. Her face fell back down, her eyes on her lap, where her crumpled hands lay. Some teardrops spilled onto her hands and pants. Her hands tightened into fists and she decided that it was time for her to be strong and get up. He let her go and slowly rose, keeping to her side in the case that she'd find herself falling into tears again.

She did, propelling towards Zuko. He caught her and she gladly accepted the physical comfort, her arms wrapping around him and her tears already making a wet spot on his chest. She shuddered under the weight of her misfortune and he could feel that she had already cried herself to hollowness.

The ache in his throat and the urge to cry never went away, but he willed himself to be strong for Katara, returning her embrace.

It was always the best of men that faded first. Why?

He couldn't believe that he was thinking this, but he asked himself, why not him? He wasn't living for anything right now. If he had known this was going to happen, he would have willingly switched his life with Aang's. She wouldn't have to suffer like this. Their family wouldn't have to suffer like this. Zuko had nothing, no one was relying on him, and he had no one to stay alive for. Anything to see her not in this state.

But god, he couldn't think like this—not at a time like this. Now he had to be there for her.

"Here, come let's sit down," he softly suggested, bringing both their bodies towards the couch, knowing that they were most likely going to be sitting in tears there for quite a while.

He quickly checked the time. It was little past a quarter after two in the morning.

His eyes flipped back to the window, looking out toward the moon and the night star-ridden sky, where he assumed all of Aang's ambitions and dreams landed.

"Zuko?" she murmured in a voice that he almost missed.

"Hm?"

"Stay here with me?"

He voiced an 'mhm,' or at least he thought he did, but his breath wasn't strong enough to carry out his response. Katara probably would have understood his silence, however, so he left his voiceless reply unrectified, instead bringing in his arm so that she could more comfortably lean on him.

Eventually her breath calmed, sleep falling over her. Feeling her rhythmic warm expels of air against the base of his neck, he attempted to turn to sleep himself, but found it extremely difficult to do so.

And here he was, having always dreamt of having Katara in his arms. He had come here to see her, still unable to let her go. Now that he had arrived, Aang passed—was it all just Zuko's willing that caused this all to happen? Did he have an unconscious motive to get rid of Aang because of his bitterness? Was this accident all somehow orchestrated by his ill-willing against their future family from back then when he found out that she was taken?

But he didn't hate Aang, did he? He had never placed the anger towards his very good friend—it was always on himself for having not taken the opportunity to tell her how he truly felt. Perhaps he was resentful against Aang for taking away his chance?

He rewound his past thoughts over and over in his head. Could he have caused this all unknowingly?

Was he happy now that he technically could be with Katara, with Aang out of the—

_Shit, don't think that way, _he reprimanded himself.

He wasn't any happier at all. He didn't want to see her like this.

Why Aang? Why couldn't he have been the one to take the sacrifice?

But shit, he was going back to where he started with this thinking. Why couldn't he just go to damn sleep? He didn't want to be awake anymore; he didn't want to think anymore.

…

_A knock on his door._

At this time?, _he thought, taking the headphones off his ears and stepping quietly toward the door so that his sleeping roommate wasn't disturbed. Perhaps his roommate had been expecting someone? But then he wouldn't be asleep, would he? And Zuko himself wasn't expecting anyone to come over—unless Sokka had some sort of a prank up his sleeve—_

"_Oh," he greeted when he saw who was behind the door. "You okay, Katara?"_

_The freshman girl nodded, rubbing a tear away from her eye. "I just need some company?"_

_Zuko looked back at his room and figuring that she needed some private space, he replied, "Yeah, sure. Let's go take a walk," and he swiftly swiped his keys off his desk before shutting his dorm door behind him and guiding her outside._

_He still wasn't sure how to act around Sokka's younger sister. It seemed that she was going to be integrating herself into the bro-dom that he and Sokka were in, especially after Sokka didn't seem to mind if his little sister stuck around to hang out with them as long as she brought along her cute Suki friend. Sokka seemed to have developed a fancy for the Earth Nation sophomore. But that probably meant that Zuko was going to have to get to know both girls well, seeing that they'd be around now._

_He himself wasn't entirely sure how to deal with her, but it seemed that Katara had already developed a feeling of trust for him, which was interesting to see, since in the beginning of the year she distanced herself from him. He assumed that it was because of his unfriendly aura, something that he was sure that he gave off, but it seemed now that Katara was already getting comfortable in his presence._

To the extent that she confided in him_, he realized, once he heard her sniffle in the middle of their walk. Taking her towards a nearby bench in the courtyard of his dorm, he motioned for her to sit, doing the same once she followed his instruction._

"_What happened?" he asked._

_She shook her head. "I'm just not…feeling very good."_

"_You can tell me," he assured, and then thought for a moment about how he could perhaps help her feel better._

_He decided that some sort of physical touch would aide in this sort of situation, and he subsequently put one arm around her shoulders, bringing her in to lean against his shoulder. He could feel her rhythmic warm breath against the base of his neck, heating and then cooling in the foggy spring night. His eyes rolled upwards to the moon and the stars while he waited, deciding that it was best for her to just sort it all out in her head._

"_Zuko?"_

"_Hm?" he had almost missed her voice, distracting himself by tracing his own constellations in the sky._

"_Stay here with me?"_

_His head inadvertently turned to meet her eyes. "Yeah, for sure."_

**divider**

"You have to eat something at least," he insisted, watching her grab her jacket from her closet.

"I just…don't have an appetite right now," she replied. And then after a second she added, "Sorry, I just…can't really eat right now; thank you, though." And then another thought occurred to her, "Can you take care of—"

"Yeah, don't worry about it," he answered, knowing she'd ask about Kya. She'd probably be out for a while, helping determine the plans for her husband's memorial service.

She stepped toward the front door. "Alright," she announced quietly. "I'm going." She quickly checked her wrist for the time, but suddenly was struck when she didn't see her watch on her wrist.

He saw on her face the moment she remembered where her watch was.

Interrupting any sort of tearsome breakdown, Zuko quickly got up, snapping off his own watch. "Here, take mine," he said, holding out his watch toward her.

Her surprise in seeing his watch danced across her face.

"You still have my watch," she remarked, almost hesitantly.

…

"_Well then, have a safe trip, or rather adventure!" Sokka said, waving and then giving Zuko a bro hug. "Man, it's going to be so weird to not be seeing you around anymore. Keep it real, bro."_

"_Congrats on graduating, bro," the departing male answered, patting Sokka on the back. Suki followed, giving him a hug, wishing him the best of luck._

_Between Suki and Aang, Toph tapped him in the arm to locate him first, before punching him in the shoulder. "See ya and have fun, Hothead! You'll be missed around here."_

_Aang stepped forward to give Zuko a bro hug practically in the same manner as Sokka. "Have an awesome time wherever you're going. I'm sure you'll be fine whatever you end up doing."_

"_Thanks," he replied and returned the affection. "Keep going at it. You just have a couple more years until graduation and then you're out of the hellhole like I am now."_

"_Aw, admit it, you're going to miss this place," Suki retorted._

"_It's why he stayed for a co-term year," Toph agreed._

_He rolled his eyes and gave everyone a final goodbye before heading off towards the airplane gate._

"_Hey wait!" Katara exclaimed, "don't forget about me!" She rushed over, giving him one last embrace. He dropped his suitcase off to the side, making sure to return her hug. She released him a few seconds later and then withdrew something from her purse. "Here!"_

"_What's this?" he said, running his hands over the rectangular box._

"_Open it!" she encouraged. "Hurry before you miss your flight!"_

_He nimbly unwrapped the package and then produced a silver black-faced watch. "Wow, Katara, thanks; you really didn't have—"_

"_Put it on!" and she took the scraps of the packaging away for him while he slipped the cool metal over his left wrist. He fumbled a bit with the clasp and she quickly came forward to help him put it on. "There," she said, with a smile._

"_Nice," Zuko remarked. "Thanks again. But why—"_

"_Don't you remember? You promised that you'd keep in touch, and that we'd still be together!"_

_She remembered? Zuko wasn't sure whether to be pleasantly surprised or shockingly astounded._

_They had come so far from the first time they met each other. To think, that once he didn't even know what to do when she was present around him…_

We'd still be together…_, he recalled. What did that mean to her? Oh god, this was not the right time to be thinking about that sort of thing. Or maybe, he should just confess it all to her right away, right then and there? Wait, but here, in front of everyone like this—wait but when was he ever going to get another chance to do so—_

"_For the rest of _time_!" she concluded, pointing down at the face of the watch, and the emphasis of the last word evoked a small chuckle from him._

"_Ah, you're so punny," he said, rather sarcastically. "Well, no matter how far I am, I'll be there for you, _whenever_," he, too, touched the face of his watch at his last word, pulling his statement half out of his ass, half from the depths of his heart._

* * *

**Mergh, a shorter chapter…but, please do review! It's some awesome support and it's great to hear from you guys about the writing I've worked on for quite some time! And this is actually experimental writing—it's a lot more constrained than my informal writing—so please do criticize too if you see something is just totally wrong (ForeverMartyr, I know you're good with commas ;))! **

**What do you guys like/what do you guys not like/all that jazz that should go into reviews (comments, they're called now, huh?) **

**Thanks all in advance—and I do reply to reviews (because it's my **_**honor**_**)!**


	5. Chapter 5

**:D I'm so grateful for these wonderful readers of mine! And watch out—this chapter is substantially longer and more dense than the previous ones, so use the bathroom, get some food, and find a comfortable place to sit down and—hopefully—enjoy! **

**And before I continue, I need to give a shout out to this anonymous reviewer—BROWNeyes: GOSH reveal yourself you elusive review ninja! At least give me the favor to thank you for the continuous support! As for the Zutara kick—let's see how spicy you like your salsa. :)**

**(The chapter's super Zuko-heavy and a lot about his history. Play some analytical games; see if you can catch all the important juicy details! Actually, I have to admit that this chapter right now is pretty much a lot of the timeline of the story and what happened in the past that leads up to where we are right now.)**

* * *

"Well?" he asked when he heard her return.

It took her a moment to reply. "It's going to be Tuesday next week. The city's going to have a whole memorial service for him too…since he…was mayor." He noticed a rolled newspaper in her hand, the cover photo largely displaying Aang's face in color. "I'm so exhausted," she murmured, looking down at the newspaper in her hand and stopping in the middle of the hallway.

Zuko quickly took her over to sit down at the kitchen table, watching her continue to gaze at Aang's smiling face. He glanced over it once, and tore his eyes away again, fearing that staring for another second would take his calm composure out of him and bring him down to tears. Her eyes glazed over and he suggested, "Here let me get something for you to drink."

He had already prepared a pot of water to boil over and threw in some loose leaves into two cups and slowly poured the steaming water into the cups, bringing them to the table and pushing one gently into her hands. He hoped she would at least drink—she must have cried at least twice the amount that was in the teacup and her lips were completely chapped, her eyes red and swollen around the lids, her hands on the brink of jittering.

Her hands cupped around the drink, fingers jumping from the porcelain every now and then because of the heat from the tea. Her lips eventually touched the drink and she swallowed, setting the drink back down to the table with a soft clack.

"You know," she remarked, and his head bounced up to catch her words. "After all those years of living with your uncle, you'd think you'd be able to serve good tea." A light smile lifted the corners of her mouth.

"What are you talking about, this is perfectly delicious!" he defended, her contagious smile spreading over his jaw. "Drink up; it'll make you feel better."

"Right now it's making me feel worse," she laughed.

He followed suit, laughing as well, his stomach finally being able to settle now that she seemed back in her spirits.

"So um, are there still any leftovers from that stew?"

"Of course, let me heat some for you," he replied, with a breath of relief.

**divider**

"Where's Kya?" she asked, while setting a washed dish down onto the dish rack.

"I had her playing with her stuffed animals in her room."

She nodded and wiped her hands on the kitchen towel, heading towards her child's room.

"Are you going to tell her?" he asked, and Katara stopped for a moment, turned around and nodded.

Zuko didn't press further, later settling onto the sofa to obtain sleep, something he had lacked the night before. Face down on the pillow, he turned his head up again toward the window, noticing the full moon outside. He must have not noticed it developing over the past few nights, distracted by his worry about Katara's emotional state.

_Hm, the full moon, _he thought.

What a time for that to arrive.

…

_Lying across his bed, he raised his cell phone to his ear._

_The ringtone cut. "Hey Zuko!" Her melodic voice._

"_What's up?"_

"_You finally called me!"_

"_What are you talking about—we talked just four days ago."_

"_No but that time, I called you."_

_He felt his eyebrow raise in question. "…what's the difference?"_

"_It's because I was the one that initiated the call—you haven't ever been the one to call me since you left. So much for that promise! I'm the one that keeps reminding you to keep in touch! I bet you're hardly talking to anyone else!"_

"_Not true, I'm still in a long text conversation with Aang and I got a call from Sokka and Suki the other day," he defended._

_He felt her eyes rolling, a sigh resonating over the line. "So what's been up?"_

"_Hm, I think I've essentially finished my work off here in the Fire Nation. Remember that project I was telling you about?"_

"_Ah yeah, so are you going to be leaving the Fire Nation soon?"_

"_Not sure. Perhaps I'll stay a while and enjoy the beaches before I move on."_

"_Oh, you're coming back to Republic City?"_

"_Sorry no…I have one more place to stop by. I was thinking that I should stop by some village in the Earth Nation, help them out and renovate their village. I was thinking to install some running water and electricity over there."_

"_Wow, sounds awesome! You're so good, Zuko."_

"_I just have to do some research and learn how to do all that. I mean, I'm not trained in mechanical engineering or any kind of urban planning at all. Probably need to talk to some consultants before I actually get out there."_

"_Hm," she said approvingly. "Well over here, I haven't been doing anything productive. I am going to be doing some RN nursing training though, starting that within the next month. It's so weird to be out of college, you know? I just keep waking up in the morning thinking that I'm late for a class or something and that I actually have to always be working toward something. But it's so strange! Right now, I'm honestly just waiting to start on my training; it's not like I have to actually be studying or writing a paper or doing much of anything! I mean, I guess I could technically be doing something while I'm idle, like getting a temporary job to earn some extra pocket money…"_

_He added some approving grunts and 'uh-huh's every now and then, really just forgetting about the meaning of the words that she was saying and concentrating more on the music of her voice, imagining what she was probably doing in the meantime. Knowing her, she was probably sitting down at a table, gesturing to no one while she was blabbering on the phone, her hand slapping the table occasionally whenever she had to emphasize something._

"…_but otherwise, post-graduation life is awesome. I don't think I would have ever believed you because I thought I'd miss the college bubble, but I'm living the life right now and it's not like college ever really leaves you. Besides going back to visit campus is sometimes annoying. I mean seeing people at the coffeehouse that you know is great but for the most part, you just feel so out of place in a place that you used to feel so at home in, simply because you're older than everyone else and you're done with college life, you know?"_

"_Yeah, completely understand," he chipped in quickly, coming back into the conversation and out of his individual thoughts. "So how's living with Suki?"_

"_Living with her is great, aside from having to see Sokka practically every weekend, which gets annoying sometimes because I'd have to ignore their flirting. But hey, that's usually when I make calls to friends and to you and stuff, so it's still productive time. Otherwise, I'll just be on my laptop with my headphones way up high and just disregard their sucking each other's faces and catch up with all my TV shows…"_

_He just couldn't help but love how cute and bubbly she was. So optimistic all the damn time! He couldn't ever be that way—always that emo kid in the corner that was more social than he ever intended to be. And she could talk forever…making up for his lack of topic. She was just perfect—something that he could probably never hope to be. She was practically his immediate opposite, yet he couldn't find any reasons to hate her._

_At least not at this point._

_He just fell more and more in love with her with every second, treasuring every moment with her._

_And to think about how far they had come from first meeting each other…_

"…_and the other night, we were making some curry but Sokka didn't seem to want to taste it, even though we told him to trust that it was okay to eat…"_

_The thought came to him so suddenly that he questioned whether or not he actually thought it._

_He was going to marry her._

_Already he didn't see himself without her. He was going to get a ring and he was going to propose to her once he saw her again. He was going to tell her then and there, that she meant more to him than anything else in the world, and that he wanted to be the one that she could always count on and always depend on, the one that she could share her deepest fears and darkest glories with, the one to give her everything her heart ever desired…_

"_Zuko?"_

"_What?" he replied, trying to recover the last bits of her rambling._

"_Well, what do you think?"_

_He bullshitted. "I think that's cool."_

"_Really? Hm, I guess so. Thanks for the input. You're always so helpful," she concluded._

"_Whatever you need," he said. Deciding that he needed a clear mind to think about his sudden plans, he figured that he needed to close the conversation. "Well…it must be getting late on your end. I mean, it's fine on my side because I'm some hours behind you but you should probably be getting some sleep."_

"_Nah, I don't mind. I don't have anything to wake up for tomorrow—"_

"_That sounds really depressing if I take it out of context."_

_She laughed. "You know what I mean! And I like talking to you—"_

"_Unfortunately."_

"_Ah shut up!" she playfully scolded. "I know you don't mind whenever I…"_

_He was going to get a ring before he headed off for the Earth Nation. He knew the jewelers in the area and he'd probably be too busy in the Earth Nation on his renovation idea in that village._

"…_but I guess it is getting pretty late, huh?"_

"_I'm sure it is," he replied, returning to the conversation._

"_Okay then, well I guess I'll have to leave you for a goodnight, then!"_

"_Mmkay. Night."_

"_Night!"_

_He took the phone off of his ear and thought for a long moment, staring out his window at the full moon. He wasn't sure where this idea came from, but now that he couldn't get it out of his head and he found less and less reasons to ask for her hand and get that ring. He tried to rationalize his thoughts but asked himself why the hell he had to think through everything over at least hundred times. Why the hell couldn't he just go by his gut feelings?_

Just this once_, he thought. Just this once, he wouldn't think about his decision. _

_He would just fucking do it because his heart told him to._

_His phone vibrated and he picked it up off his chest._

_Mai?_

_He didn't even understand why he still had her number stored in his phone._

_And why was she calling him anyway?_

"_Hello?"_

"_Hey…Zuko?"_

"_Yeah, what's up."_

"_Just wanted to congratulate you."_

"_For what?"_

"_I heard about your patent, you know, the one that redirects lighting and converts it into electric power for use in the home. It's all over the news. You're doing some good work with Hitachi Electronics."_

"_Right, thanks."_

"_I've been a bit bored lately and realized that I haven't seen you in a while. Want to catch up some time this week?"_

_Zuko's lips curled into an S. What exactly did she mean by 'catch up'? "Yeah sure. What are you thinking about?"_

"_I don't know, what do you suggest?"_

_He brought up the first thing that came to his mind. "How about the beach?"_

"_Sounds good. Is tomorrow afternoon okay? I'm free all day tomorrow."_

"_I'll pick you up," he offered. "You're still living in that same apartment with Ty Lee, right?"_

"_Same boring old place."_

**divider**

"_Here, got you an ice cream," Zuko said, offering the raven haired girl a cone._

"_Thanks," she replied, taking the sweet refreshment._

_Sitting on the towel aside her, he sat cross-legged, taking a bite out of his own icy treat. He still hadn't been able to elicit much out of her, but he was surprised at her lack of words. She had always been succinct and straightforward with her words. It sorta frustrated him, however, since he was trying to figure out why exactly she had decided that she wanted to see him again._

_Perhaps she had just remembered about him after having seen news about his patent and wanted to say hi for old times' sake._

_The last time he had seen her was when they had decided to conclude their relationship because Zuko was going off to Republic City University while Mai would still be in high school in the Fire Nation. Mai had been relatively upset that he didn't trust that they could continue a long distance relationship._

_This could potentially be her attempt at trying to get back together with him again…_

"_So how is everything going?" he asked, forcing himself out of his thoughts._

"_Oh nothing much has happened. I'm an accountant now, had majored in finance."_

"_I see. Well, I've been doing well myself. Got out of college about a year ago and decided to travel around the world a bit to get some experience before going to settle and get an actual job."_

"_Exciting."_

"_Yeah, I just came in from the South Water Nation several months ago after helping program a modeling application that would predict the direction of water overflow. They have a hard time dealing with flash floods especially in the spring when all the snow is melting and hundreds of new tributaries form out of the major river systems there, which makes it extremely difficult to place any permanent settlements down at any point in the ground. My program will hopefully allow them to avoid areas of high risk flooding so that they can determine where to best build their respective buildings and then just barricade the flooding from that point on," he explained, pausing momentarily. "And here, I just decided that I wanted to invent something of my own and got a research position at Hitachi. But I guess you already know that."_

"_I just found out the other day that you were back in the Fire Nation. I didn't know you've been here for a while until that news report."_

"_I came on my own. Didn't really tell anyone. Probably only Azula knows, actually. And you, now, I guess," he said, in half an apology._

_She didn't reply, focusing back on her cone. He thought she wasn't going to say anything more, but she suddenly said, "I'm really happy for you—you're doing some good work." Giving him one of those rare smiles, she added, "Unlike my money and number excursions."_

_His eyes remained on her smile—he suddenly remembered that her smile was one of the things that he adored about her, and he was glad that it hadn't changed one bit, the little toothy grin that collapsed the second it was built. She was still the same emotion-hoarding, shy-to-the-touch, and jadedly observant person that he had always known her as._

"_Ah," he said, in sudden recollection, reaching over himself to grab a wrapped box that he had set aside._

_She took it in both hands, holding her ice cream cone between her knees. "Oh. You didn't have to," she thanked him, in her melancholic voice, clashing with the light in her eyes. "And you even wrapped it."_

_He was surprised he could still read her, and that despite her rather unenthusiastic reaction, he could still feel her heart thumping quickly._

_Another smile escaped from her when she brought the knives to light. "You still remember what I like," she remarked, holding the blades down to reflect the sharp afternoon sun._

_One of Mai's passions was cooking, and the one thing that she always loved was a set of new and beautiful knives, what she considered to be the most essential and the most functional kitchen utensil. He remembered from one time when he had visited her house once and was helping her cook that she had gone on about knives, holding the one that was passed down from her ancestors to lie in their kitchen today._

_Cooking is something that we've been doing for ages, an art that's been passed down from generation to generation, she had said. It's one of the most important cultural evolutions that we still carry on; something that brings cultures together because of the different ingredients that we use, and something that also can demonstrate the roots of her identities. Knives were one of those gateways in which cooking was able to further advance. We have so many unique words for 'cut,' like mince, slice, chop, dice, etc, and we have so many different kinds of knives by which to do it. But the knife in all its complexity is just simply a blade of metal. And a handle of course, but that's only because we protect ourselves from it. Knives are durable, can be used for multiple things beyond cooking, and, at least in my family, they've been passed down from parent to child, carrying our family seal and connecting us through time. I mean, to think this same knife that I'm holding right now was also used by one of my relatives in the past—this knife has faithfully served and followed the guidance of so many of our hands!_

_She could go on about the art of making the blade, of maintaining the sharpness, of everything and anything related to knives. The subject was one of those things that brought a completely different side of her out._

"_I thought you'd appreciate some new knives to call your own…or at least add those to your collection," he said._

"_I've never seen this style before—did you get them in the Fire Nation?"_

"_This set is actually from Republic City—I had one of my friends mail the knives to me overnight."_

"_Thank you," she said. "I actually have something for you too." And she produced a long rectangular box out of her purse._

_Zuko instantly knew what it was already but he unwrapped it with all the same curiosity._

"_Wow, thank you," he said, feeling the silky metal of the watch._

"_I thought you'd like something practical, but I guess you have a watch already," she said, noting the metal on his bare wrist and looking off to the side, as if to hide her embarrassment._

"_No, it's okay. I'll wear this watch eventually," he assured her, but then the ocean's roar turned his head toward the crashing waves and he saw hints of _her_ blue eyes within the water. And suddenly he realized that what he had just said might have been a lie._

_He looked back at Mai, seeing that she was keeping her hair considerably longer than the last time he had seen her. Her face had matured from adolescence but her liquid dark brown eyes were still the same. Though she still had her childish slimness, her curves had developed to its fullest extent, her fair skin seeming to crave a caress._

_Had she been waiting for him to return this entire time? Had she not let go of him after all those years she had probably slipped his mind?_

_Just as he thought it, her fingers cautiously laced over his hand as she leaned back on her arms, finished with her dessert._

"_Hey, um, I'm not going to be in the Fire Nation for much longer," he said._

"_You're leaving?" and he knew she had omitted 'again.'_

"_Yeah…I finished my project with Hitachi much quicker than I expected and I'm planning to go to the Earth Nation next. And um, I'm not sure if I'm going to be back in the Fire Nation. I might end up staying in Republic City, actually, after all of this."_

"_I see." Her hand didn't retreat from his._

_His eyes turned again towards the ocean's horizon. "But don't worry about that for now," he corrected, realizing he was probably slowly ripping her heart out. He removed his hand from hers and brought his arm up and around her shoulders, letting his torso meet her arm. "Let's just take the time we have left together."_

**divider**

He came in through the front door, greeting the warmth of the home graciously. Putting his coffee down on one of the dressers by the front door, he took off his jacket heading towards the coat rack. Hesitating momentarily and seeing one of Aang's coats, he decided not to hang his jacket, pulling it back into his arms and grabbing his coffee once again.

"Hey Zuko," and her voice scared the shit out of him since he had only realized that she had been behind him.

"Morning Katara," he breathed out quickly, holding his breath to help slow his heart.

"Is something wrong?" and she reached forward to take his jacket.

"No, nothing, I just went out for some breakfast and a coffee," he replied, his speech slowing as he saw her hanging his jacket onto the coat rack.

"Oh well, I hope you still have an appetite. I cooked a bit of breakfast—"

"I'll join to eat," he declared. He wasn't going to force her to eat by herself, especially after it had been so hard to regain her appetite after Aang's pronounced death. He wasn't going to discourage her cooking and eating on her own accord.

"Oh okay," she said, her voice brightening. "Kya is already eating—I'm sure she'll be happy to see you."

He nodded and made his way over to the kitchen table. Katara, who had walked faster than him, already got another plate and glass for him, setting them down on the table. To his shock, she had placed the utensils at Aang's seat, but he covered his alarm, figuring it was better to not make a fuss about it before the widow was reminded of her husband's decease.

_Widow, _he thought again, never having used that term in reference to Katara, though she technically was one. It just didn't roll off the tongue well, he guessed.

He must have sat down a bit too slowly, because she noticed this as well.

"Is your back okay?"

Zuko motioned that she not bother herself with the issue. "Don't worry about it."

She sat down, forking a few eggs into her mouth. "I'm going to be a bit busy today with the arrangements. Do you think you can…" and her eyes shifted to Kya, who was occupied, drawing swirls in her pancake with the syrup. He gave her a quick nod and she returned a grateful look.

"Kya, you want to be my tour guide around Republic City today?"

The girl's eyes sparkled, her father's shade of mahogany rippling through her irises. "Yes!" she exclaimed excitedly, and she practically put down her fork and started to get out of her seat.

"Finish breakfast first and then we'll go," he smiled, holding her down.

**divider**

"And here's the park!" Kya said, bursting into laughter for no real apparent reason except that she saw a bunch of birds flap away from the sidewalk where they were walking.

He offered her his enthusiasm. "Wow! Do you come here very often?"

"Mom and Dad always take me here on the weekend! We feed birds and play on swings and Dad plays ball with me. Sometimes I see Uncle Sokka and Auntie Suki and they have a dog that I play fetch with."

Of course. He didn't expect Aang and Katara to be bad parents. They would of course be the kind nurturing and patient parents that he himself didn't trust himself to be.

"Here come, let's go for a swing ride then. I'll push you way up high," he said, and the girl excitedly led the way to them.

After a whole afternoon of childish fun and exclamation marks, even Kya wanted to take a seat by the duck pond to rest awhile. Zuko put a protective arm around the two-year-old and looked around the park.

Families all over the place; couples all about his age.

What the hell was he doing with his life?

"Want to get something to eat, Kya?" And she led him to one of the street vendor carts, where she politely asked for a hot dog with no ketchup and just mustard. While she slowly worked her way around the messy food, Zuko asked the vendor for some extra napkins and then turned around, suddenly spotting the marble stones that he had passed the first day he had come to Republic City.

AANG FENG  
MAYOR OF REPUBLIC CITY  
(2010- )

They still hadn't changed the date, he noted.

"Dad buys me something to eat too," she said, taking another bite.

"You've got a mustard nose," he replied, wiping the yellow off her face.

Following the quick snack and with no bounds to her energy, she made her way to another side of the large park, showing Zuko the fountain, where he provided her some change to make a few wishes with.

It got a bit chilly and towards the evening; the sun was already gone, reminding them that the short days and long nights of the winter were on their way. Zuko took Kya's hand and went toward a nearby café, where he bought her a hot cocoa with extra marshmallows. She sipped happily away at the hot beverage, carrying on in her babble about the random occurrences of her life, which he found endearing.

While she went through her chocolate, he looked out the foggy window of the café at the soft glow of the streetlights outside.

…

"_Close your eyes, Jin."_

_She did and he swiftly, trying not to make a sound at all, went over to the edge of the fountain, flipping open a metal container towards the base. He flipped on the switch and then gracefully stood again in front of her._

"_Look," he said._

_He didn't miss the reflection of the lantern lights dancing across her excited eyes, which drank in the majestic illuminations of the night._

"_It's so beautiful!" she exclaimed. "What did you do?!"_

"_I finished installing the remainder of the wires. The rest of your village completely has electricity now," he explained, giving her a smile._

"_I just can't believe how much you've done for us. I have no idea how we're going to thank you at the end of all of this!"_

"_It's no big deal. I mean you guys have provided me a place to stay all this time and fed me and all that stuff. If anything, this is my payment back to you guys—"_

"_Nonsense! What you've done is so much more than just offering a room and meals! I mean…you've already brought us running water and now you've just finished up bringing us electricity…I mean that's unbelievable. You're just an angel—I don't even understand how you're so generous and how much time you're sacrificing just to help out this little dot on the world map. And you did this all without asking for any money from the council and just…I mean, that's unbelievable."_

"_It's what I came to do from the beginning," Zuko said. "I mean, I actually barely knew what I was doing. I'm not trained in this sort of thing, I just—"_

"_Well I think you did a great job. Don't refuse the compliment."_

"_I—"_

"_Nope! I don't want to hear it! Here, come let's sit down," she said, taking his hand and guiding him towards a bench by the fountain. They sat down, listening to the hiccups and chuckles of the dancing water for a moment._

_He hadn't really been able to really relax until that moment—always having something to do, even through the winter months, insisting that he still had to work on the blueprints for the water system and for the wiring. _

_Come to think of it, he hadn't been able to hear from anyone since his cell phone had been out of battery before he could help put some sockets into people's homes. Even then, he didn't get any reception either. No texts, calls, Internet…for a good two years._

What an awesome retreat in that sense, _he thought. This would serve as the hermit period of his life._

_Strangely, lacking any sort of connection with the rest of the world aside from talking to visitors from around the other nations didn't seem abnormal any longer. _

_Though…he did wonder how his friends were doing in this couple of years he hadn't heard from them—how Katara was doing after all this time…_

_She took his head between both her warm hands, resting that all on her lap._

"_Thanks for doing this, Zuko," she said. "I mean, this totally isn't necessary at all. Usually the lanterns are only lit for special occasions."_

"_Well this is special—I've finished installing everything. After a good two years here, this couldn't be more memorable, right?" _

_She laughed._

"_And I mean, this fountain is important to you and your village isn't it?"_

_She nodded, sighing in happiness once more at the beauty of the specks of light flickering off the chortling water._

_Her laughter died off. "So now what, Zuko?"_

"_What do you mean?"_

"_I mean, you're done here now, aren't you?"_

_He sensed the bittersweet of her voice, the way she loosely yet securely held his hand in her lap._

She had been there the entire time, hadn't she?_, he realized. Always sticking around his side while he was too busy at work, making sure that he had enough water, ensuring that he had enough to eat for the amount of physical work that he was doing. Talking to him when he was working late at night, always encouraging him and keeping him company. Her family was the one that had offered to host him for the entire two years of his time in the tiny village._

_Feeling immensely stupid for not having noticed this all before, he found now that holding her hand meant more to her than it did to him._

"_I…guess so," he said, but then he remembered the guilt of the lie he had told Mai and corrected himself. "Yes, I'll be leaving soon." _

_He couldn't leave her waiting for him._

_Jin didn't reply to that, continuing to look vacuously at the spouting water._

_The fountain was once hand-pumped for the special occasions that she had mentioned. But now it operated on its own, able to be enjoyed at whatever time. With the water running, there was less moss and water-based insects crawling in the freshwater, too._

"_Close your eyes," she said softly suddenly. He turned to look at her, seeing her patient face look back up at him._

_He did so and a moment after, felt the caress of her lips on his, a soft kiss._

_His first._

_He wouldn't mind staying here for a while longer, actually. The culture was so accepting of him and it seemed that everyone in the village knew him by name—appreciated the work that he did…_

_She pulled away but he leaned forward and caught her lips once again._

"You mean like finding a girlfriend."

_He jerked back, hearing that voice in his head, remembering that he had a ring in his pocket, recalling that his next stop was Republic City, realizing that he was so close to…_

"_What's wrong?" Jin asked as she felt him slipping from her hands._

"_It's complicated," he explained briefly. "I…gotta go."_

**divider**

"Mom told me that Dad is gone."

He was jerked back to the present at the morbid comment.

"Oh, Kya…"

"Mom told me last night. She said he isn't around anymore," she added, before tilting the rest of the large cup's liquid into her mouth.

He was stricken by how plainly and simply the girl was saying all this.

_And our next child will never get to know him…_

He didn't know if Kya knew that this meant she would never be seeing him again.

* * *

**Well there goes probably what will be the longest chapter of this story! Please do tell me what you thought of it!**

**Lol, there was an immensely large paragraph about cooking in the flashback about Mai. I sincerely must say that I feel some of those sentiments about cooking and stuff. Not so much about the knives, but I can still see how the girl loves those smiling blades.**

**And then with Jin, aw, that girl and their date was one of the cutest things that happened in that the Earth book, well until our social awkward Zuko broke it in the end. But yes, he definitely still brought the lights to the fountain! (I actually try to make as many parallels with the canon as I can in this AU world lol—aside from Zuko not actually dropping the ice cream on Mai)**

**Also for the eye colors of Katara (cerulean) and Kya (mahogany), which I know will be coming up again and again, I'm often using the same adjectives because…I just wanted to give it some sort of constant since I wanted to create a sort of 'haunting' effect. Hope y'all don't mind my lack of creativity with the colors.**

**Anyway, do drop a review! I'd like to know what's going on in your heads… **

**thir13enth**

**(and as a reluctant postscript admission, I can't promise another chapter until...later; sorrys 'bout that-sorta kinda busy; don't poke me too hard)**


	6. Chapter 6

**Ahh! This story has totally been longer than I was ever expecting! And imagine, I was about to put it all into two chapters! Thank you again for all the support, my wonderful readers!**

* * *

He returned to their home in the late afternoon, first hearing the sound of a news reporter over the television leaking from the living room. Even from the hallway, he could tell the hot topic of the day was Aang's death, by the sound of some sort of memorializing music and talk of a crashing airplane. The silence otherwise in the house told him that Katara was probably not in her best mood.

Zuko found her, sitting in front of the television, still as a stone and frozen, her eyes glazed in the television light.

It wasn't good for her to be seeing this, and he quickly thought of something to do.

"Katara," and her head turned slightly to look him in the eye. "Come," he said, his head nodding to the side, motioning towards the door. "Kya's with Sokka and it's good to get some fresh air."

She looked down for a moment but then turned off the screen and followed after Zuko.

**divider**

"_I don't remember any of this," she pouted, but he assured her that this was the same place, and that they had been here before. "When was this fence here?"_

"_Katara," he sighed, stopping to turn back at her. "You were blindfolded the last time I took you up here—you're not going to remember what you haven't seen."_

_She flushed at her embarrassment, and then defended herself, "But I could have still heard this metal and ducking underneath to make it past."_

_He didn't say anything, biting his tongue and smiling—letting her get her way._

_A few shrubs and a brush of branches later, she gasped._

"_Oh, this is never going to get old…" and Katara went right ahead to immerse her eyes in the landscape of the cliff once more, sitting down on her knees on the grass, taking a deep breath of the air, as if she could inhale the beauty of it. She turned towards him once more. "Thanks for taking me back here again."_

_He shrugged and leaned backwards to lie down in the grass, hands under his head. He considered closing his eyes and just basking in the sun while she enjoyed the scenery, but his eyes trailed over to watch her time and again. He couldn't think of many things more that he cherished than her—her caramel mocha skin that still let even the lightest of her blushes through, her ocean wide eyes that told him what at depths she was feeling, her silky tickle of her thick brown waves on his neck when he surprised her with a hug from behind, her spice-tinged wood smell, her arms' efforts in returning just as strong an embrace as though love was all a challenge…_

_His amber eyes suddenly widened at some unconscious decision that he had made right then and there._

I love you, _he thought, and then sharply sat back up, bringing his head to a dizzy swirl at the immediate change of posture. He tried to recover his sight and full consciousness as soon as possible—he wasn't going to let this chance loose—he was leaving Republic City tomorrow on the plane damn it!_

_And when he regained his vision, there she was, looking back at him._

"_I need to—"_

"_I have to tell you something," she interrupted before she laughed upon realizing that she had just cut him off._

"_Me too,"he replied. Then he motioned with his head for her to start. "You go first."_

_She parked directly to his right, sitting right beside him so that they were touching knees—or thighs—he wasn't sure because his heart was just ready to be plucked and blown up._

"_I love you," she said._

_And all the world fell down._

* * *

**thir13enth**


	7. Chapter 7

**Oof, I'm so sorry that I killed you guys last chapter. It was a short chapter (I'm sorta timeless and occupied right now) and I didn't warn you (bad memory) and it was a rather bad cliffhanger (writer's tease)…**

* * *

"_I love you," she said._

_And all the world fell down._

_His jaw dropped lightly and he struggled to spit out what he had originally planned to say, watching her parted lips turn towards him, her stunningly beautiful cerulean eyes looking up to meet his frozen ones. _

_He could feel her leaning closer to him, his heart pounding noisily in his ear and her hand rising to hold his left cheek and his caught breath held in his paralyzed chest and her other hand cupping the shell of his right ear and one of his hands reaching up to caress the side of her waist and everything grew slow…_

_His eyes fell shut._

_His lips felt hair. His cheek felt lips._

_His eyes opened._

_She was still there—her still strikingly genuine cerulean eyes looking up at him, a small smile decorating her face._

_And suddenly he realized where his hopes and feelings covered the interpretations of the dreaded three words. _

I love you_, she had said._

_But what did that mean?_

_He slowly pulled back his hand, his heart half torn. _

_Her hands were still at his face—but he didn't expect anything; he wasn't going to rise so high only to fall back hard again._

"_You've done so much for me," she said. "And you've always been there for me whenever I needed something and you never asked for anything back. I'm just so grateful that you're in my life and I don't know how to thank you enough."_

_The words flew over his head—he was still trying to sort himself out and his heart was still frozen._

"_I'm going to miss you a lot," she continued._

_A beat, and then she came forward suddenly to give him a strong embrace, one that pulled them so close together that he was afraid she could feel his beating but punctured heart, one that almost knocked the broken unformed tears out of his eyes, one that he couldn't return without worrying that he would never be able to let go._

_So his hands hung loose, raised and making an incomplete circle around her, but unable to bring her in._

_His head turned in towards hers, nose brushing against some locks of her hair._

"_So what did you have to say to me?" she asked, her voice muffled against his collarbone._

_He thought for a moment._

"_I'm leaving tomorrow," he said._

…

"You know I never forgot about this place," she remarked, looking back to meet eyes with Zuko. "Actually I was never even able to find this place ever again after you left. I tried driving back here by memory. Aang and I spent forever trying to find this place but we never were able to find it."

He pondered her words for a moment, first relieved that she could say Aang's name without tears in her throat, and second, feeling a strange satisfaction that the couple hadn't been able to find this place—that he himself had to take Katara back here in order for her to experience the landscape again.

Maybe it was because it was the only memory, the only physical place where they had been together, and no one else had been able to share this with her, but him. A special place where only just the two of them—together, alone—had been.

But what the hell was he thinking? It was pathetic that he even thought that. He shouldn't have been thinking like that at all.

_So long sentiment, _he told himself.

"Thank you for taking me back here," she said simply, not taking her eyes off the scenery. "This place hasn't changed very much at all," she added, almost nostalgically, and he could sense the implicit contrast between it and her tumultuous life at the moment.

He watched her watch the landscape a while longer. And then she suddenly turned around and beckoned him to join her. He obligingly went over to stand at her side.

"Zuko," she said, his name soft on her tongue, and he felt her eyes fall over him. He granted her his eyes, meeting amber on ocean. He couldn't help but notice her smooth skin, mature and defined cheekbones that trailed down to her lips. Her eyes shifted downwards to the lower part of his face for a moment, and then he suddenly realized that she had raised one hand to hold his cheek.

There was something overly familiar about this scene—something that he knew he didn't want to experience again. But his heart beat harder, as though it was actually hoping—

"I love you," she said.

Dead, his breath stilled.

"I love you so much," she continued. "You've done so much for me and you've always been there to support me. I…don't know how to thank you enough for everything. I mean, even from the beginning, all the way back in college, you've been such a great friend and you let me lean on you. Sometimes it ripped me to pieces to realize how much you've done for me when I haven't been able to return it to you. And I mean, even now with him gone…"

Katara trailed off, and he could feel the shudder of tears in her voice.

She had never meant love in that sort of way.

She didn't mean it now, and she hadn't meant it back then either.

"You're so good to me, Zuko," she said, her eyes glazing, and her thumb caressed his face.

He turned his face towards her hand, touching her fingers with his lips, kissing them discreetly. He stepped forward one and brought her into an embrace, a complete one, with his body against hers as close as possible. The roundness of her belly made it slightly discomforting but he chose to ignore it for the moment. Her face rested against his chest and her hands gripped his back tightly while she tried to control her light sobbing.

"I'm so sorry," she apologized. "I've never been strong enough for my own good."

"No," he replied. "You're one of the strongest people I've ever met."

_Unlike me_, he thought.

He wasn't strong at all.

**divider**

Leaning back into the sofa, Zuko molded his body into comforting warmth while he picked up the newspaper that was left on the table nearby. He glanced over the title, knowing already what the front page cover story was and skipped down to the color photograph of the charismatic mayor of Republic City.

Having been so worried about how Katara was taking it the past few days, he realized that he hadn't really been able to reflect about Aang's death himself.

Aang and him didn't hit it off very well from the beginning, and it was more Zuko's fault than anything else. Zuko had been on his co-term year when he met Aang, and since he had been in Republic City University for the past five years, he was starting to feel extremely jaded and somewhat protective of everything that he knew. Aang had been a freshman—lively and jubilant and seeing everything as a new experience, and Zuko had thought him quite immature at the time.

It wasn't just the age difference that had made Aang grind Zuko's gears from the start; when Zuko met Toph, they got along rather quickly. It was, Zuko guessed, how _happy _Aang was. And maybe Zuko was hating on the way Aang was so free-spirited and so optimistic, because _everyone _in the group got along with Aang in a cinch. Now that he thought about it, maybe it was just that Zuko had been envious of the way Aang was able to conduct himself so…immaturely and yet was still able to be respected.

He didn't trust Aang and, at one point, voiced his opinion to Sokka, who couldn't understand at the time why Zuko felt so negatively against Aang. Zuko didn't want this kid of smiles to 'infect' his friend group and take them away from him. He despised how easily Aang was able to deal with social matters while Zuko had always thought himself socially inept.

Zuko got over it, eventually, and Aang had been just as friendly and as forgiving as he had been the first time they met—which almost set Zuko off again. But Zuko accepted and had come to respect the fact that Aang was just really good at the social field, and that even though everything seemed to come easy to Aang, Aang still had issues of his own to deal with. From there started a greater understanding of each other, and Zuko soon realized that Aang was actually a lot more mature and serious at heart than he appeared.

And now that Zuko was staring at journalistic obituary of one of his greatest companions, he wasn't sure what was going to happen to his sleep that night.

He suddenly realized that he had never actually taken a good look at Aang before he had passed away, never actually being able to meet eye to eye with the man that took Katara before he had the chance to. But now the pictures unfolded, and Zuko saw how much Aang had matured into the adult that he became, his face becoming more narrow and his eyebrows setting. There were slight wrinkles forming at the edges of his eyes and Zuko saw the dark bags under Aang's eyes.

And Aang's _eyes, _they were ages away from how young he looked. His eyes were ancient, carrying the weight of an entire city, carrying the trust of thousands of people…

But his smile was the same, a calm modest smile that could never be replicated.

In the end, Zuko could have more wisely spent a hell of a lot more time with this man, and many things that had gone between them were left without closure.

He began to feel that familiar ache of regret.

An ache that was reminiscent of that of his back.

He groaned softly, shifting in the deep-set sofa but then stopped, startled, when he noticed Katara peering into the living room.

Instinctively putting the newspaper down and pretending that he had just been sitting there blankly, he said, "I thought you were going to sleep?"

She looked down and he knew something was upsetting her, quickly going over in his head all the comforting things that he could say to make her feel better.

"It's like when you take a ticking clock out of the room, you know?" she said slowly. "I never really notice his breathing until he's gone."

To this, he didn't know what to say.

She held the silence for a bit before speaking.

"Do you think…you'd be able to join me?"

He didn't budge, but it was more out of surprise than anything else.

"…and it would be better for your back," she added, justifying her invitation.

"I…" he started, but then interrupted himself, "Sure."

"I-I'm sorry," she apologized, but he shook his head to tell her there wasn't anything to be sorry for.

He watched her slowly lower herself onto her bed first, making sure to sleep in a position to best suit her rounded body. He took the other side of the bed, slowly crawling into the sheets and feeling slightly uncomfortable with the idea of making himself comfortable in her bed. His head rested on the pillow and he sighed quickly, closing his eyes to will himself to sleep.

His eyes opened involuntarily within the next minute though and he found himself facing her.

It was different from the other night when they had shared the mattress.

It was different from in the past when they had shared the smaller dormitory bed.

Her figure was crumpled; she was curling herself into a ball.

She was vulnerable. She felt alone and like there wasn't anyone to turn to.

His left arm reached out for her, but he found that his arm wasn't long enough to let him hold her shoulder. He hesitated for a moment but then mustered the courage to lift himself off his side and descend his body closer to hers. He put out his hand again and this time, his hand was able to cover her cold shoulder.

Her body rustled at his warm touch and he began to regret what he had done before her right hand rested on top of his hand. He pondered a moment but then allowed himself to side up next to her, pressing her back against his chest and wrapping her up in an embrace. He felt her fold her arms, tucking his arms against her, welcoming the touch.

A few minutes into settling and he could hear her soft inhale and exhale, and he wondered if she could hear his own breath and if she was imagining it was someone else.

This is what he had wanted, he suddenly realized. Her in his arms, sharing warmth and memories together while they dreamed of their futures.

Taking himself out of his reverie, he suddenly realized that even after a while in his arms, she was still cold.

He had wanted to give her everything.

But he was finding more and more—feeling her shiver under the covers—that he probably wouldn't have been able to be the one to do that all along.

* * *

**I must be breaking all your hearts—why do I feel the need to torture my characters so?**

**Ah, I must be sadistic.**

**thir13enth**


	8. Chapter 8

**Thank you guys so much for all the support that you've given this story—I am truly heart warmed and touched by all of your love! But I must announce that the time has come for our little journey to end…and I am so sad about it too!**

**Nevertheless, I present the story finale.**

* * *

"Hey, morning sir."

"Ah, Zuko. What do you need?"

"I'd like to extend my time off," and he thought a moment before adding, "…indefinitely."

"I'll let the rest of the company know," his boss assured. "What happened? Family-related?"

He forced out a quick chuckle. "You can say that," he replied, and thanked his boss before hanging up the phone, walking in through the door into the house.

Hanging his jacket quickly onto the coat rack, Zuko went over to Katara's side and gave her a quick embrace. "I figured that I could help you cook again," he said, letting her go to take the knife out of her hands and continue dicing the onions.

She stepped back, smiling and wiping her hands on a nearby hand towel. "You're just going to be here until Monday, right?"

He paused for a moment but the slicing continued shortly after. "I changed my plans," he answered.

…

"_Dude, I can _not _wait at all!" said Jet as he started down the hall to his room. "The fucking concert is in _two _hours_!"

"_For real," Zuko agreed, leaning against his doorframe. "I'm leaving in a few minutes so that we could find a good place to stand."_

"_Aite, man, meet you back out here then; I'm going to change right quick. It's going to awesome—Republic City's the first in their tour—it's going to be phenomenal. And I bet you there's going to be a shitload of hot drunk girls there!"_

_The two of them laughed, returning to their rooms._

_Zuko picked up his phone from his desk and checked it for any messages._

_8 of them._

_2 from Ty Lee. He read through them relatively quickly—just some banter about her new haircut._

_6 from the Gang's GroupMe:_

"_hey guys, come to my dance show at 8!" – from Katara._

"_srry, got a practice recital" – from Suki._

"_have to write a paper before midnight" – from Sokka._

"_i wish i could come but i actually have a meeting i cant miss then" – from Aang._

"_gladly go if i could actually see you perform" – from Toph._

"_awww it's okay guys, thanks for all the support anyway!" – from Katara._

_Zuko exited from his inbox and checked the time._

"_Hm," he mumbled to himself, fingering the ticket in his pocket. He quickly got his laptop off sleep and checked the concert's line-up. _

_Some of the greatest bands were playing tonight._

_His gaze shifted over to his phone again, and he bit his lip in hesitation._

_Jet came in through the open door. "Hey, ready to go?"_

"_Yeah," Zuko replied. "Catch."_

_In Jet's hands landed Zuko's borrowed car keys. Jet looked up quizzedly at him. "You're not driving?"_

_He shook his head and then produced his concert ticket, holding it out towards Jet. "Here, I decided to not go anymore. Take Smellerbee or something—I know she really wanted to go—"_

"_Wait, what the fuck? You're not going anymore? There's like four bands that you totally love that are going to be playing! Live!"_

"_Just go," Zuko confirmed. "I have something else to do. Have an awesome time and don't get an STD."_

"_You sure?"_

"_Yeah, just go."_

_Once Jet left the room, Zuko flopped onto his bed, rubbing his eyes. "I'm a hopeless fool…" he said to himself._

**divider**

"_Ow, what the hell!"_

"_Oh I'm sorry about—Zuko! You scared me! What are you doing back here?" Katara practically cursed at him for surprising her, his hand on her shoulder._

"_Coming to your show, duh," he replied, rubbing his wrist from her earlier slap. _

"_Well…get out of the backstage! You're lucky you're not caught yet!"_

"_Don't worry, your show doesn't start until the next few minutes."_

"_I thought you had a concert to go to," she reminded him._

"_Change of plans," he answered quickly._

"_Oh…well, thanks for coming out to support me!" she stepped forward to give him a hug._

"_Yeah, anytime."_

**divider**

This wasn't the first time that he was in the family section of an event without being an actual family member.

The first time Zuko was included as part of the family was during their wedding.

And now, he was part of the family during his funeral.

She had requested that she have him by his side, along with the rest of the Gang, and they mourned together in silence at the commemoration of their fallen friend.

Nothing was louder than the lack thereof that day.

**divider**

When they returned home, Zuko put Kya down on her bed to rest, wiping the tears off the little girl's face.

"Hey, it's okay, alright? Everything's going to turn out alright," he said, not sure himself it was a lie.

The girl nodded with a frown, some fresh tears blinking out of her eyes, which Zuko was quick to clear up.

He wasn't sure if the girl was crying out of mimicry, seeing that everyone around her was so depressed, or out of some realization that something bad had happened to her father, something worse than her innocent mind could even conceive of. He bit his lip, but figured that he had already done his share of crying and held the choke in his throat.

"Just take a rest now…" his voice cracked and he mentally cursed. But the girl didn't seem to notice, reluctantly rolling under her covers. Her mahogany eyes remained open though, staring blankly at the wall behind him, and for the first time in his life, Zuko couldn't read eyes, and he thought it must be because he wasn't looking into those eyes like they were her own, but rather her father's.

He blinked, looking away. He sat for a while, one hand cradling his temples, but he forced himself to get up, soundlessly groaning with the backache that accompanied his movement.

Slowly stepping out into the hallway and closing Kya's bedroom door, leaving it open a crack, he started back towards the living room, but Katara's crumpled figure by the front door caught his eyes. He shifted directions and stepped over to her side, offering his hand out to her to help her up.

She didn't see his hand, her face covered with both her hands.

"You okay?" he asked, lowering his body to join her down at the floor.

She returned a few sniffles and some remorseful breathing.

He didn't say anything either, deciding to let her take her time. He focused on the dry sticky residue left on his cheeks from earlier, trying to rid his face of the old tears every now and then with his hands.

Eventually her sobbing subsided and her face rose from her hands. Through the corner of his eyes, he could see red lining around her eyes, oceans still glistening from her orbs, drops caught on her eyelashes, a pink weary imprint of her hands on her paler looking skin. She now hugged her knees, resting her chin on top of them, as though if she made herself as small as possible, she would disappear, and not have to feel any grief anymore.

"Thank you."

His eyes snapped open—he hadn't realized that his eyelids had shut.

"Thank you for being there for me," she clarified slowly, testing her voice out.

Taking a breath, he replied, "It's all fine." What the hell else was he supposed to say? "Aang was important to me and I wouldn't let him down by not supporting you guys," he added shortly after.

She took a moment to respond, this time with a bit more gusto. "No, but this is your vacation—it wasn't supposed to be this way."

He opened his mouth to say something but she interrupted him.

"I don't think I've ever been able to return everything that you've done for me…and it makes me feel horrible."

"Don't worry about it, Katara. Honestly…you're just denying all the great favors you've done for me," he assured. "And it's not your fault—"

"But really, Zuko," she continued, her eyes becoming ecstatic and desperate. "I didn't mean it…I-I never wanted it to go this way. I just…I just can't do anything right, and I…" she paused, looking down for a second, but then her frantic eyes lifted to meet his, and her hands gripped his shoulders in a tight clench. "You know that I made that him delay that conference? Change it to that day? All because of some stupid pain? I thought something bad was happening to the baby—it was just a stupid little thing; he didn't have to cancel his meeting to stay here to make sure I was okay—it was just a stupid stupid—"

"Katara," he interrupted, becoming worried. She was just blaming herself in her grief.

"I was stupid; I should have been able to deal with it myself—"

"Katara."

"And if he had gone that day, he wouldn't have—"

"Hey, Katara." He supported her face with both his hands and forced her to look up at him. "It's not your fault. You couldn't have controlled anything that happened."

She held her peace for a moment, but then closed her eyes and shook her head, against his hand's wishes, some tears falling out of her eyes. He felt them trickle through his fingers.

"And all I've ever done is rely on other people," she said. "Look how weak I am without anyone—I can barely take care of myself, let alone my daughter, let alone another child. Look—even now I'm just throwing everyone on you!" She raised her hands from his shoulders and tried to push his hands away but his hands stayed firmly around her face.

"Katara. This isn't something that you're supposed to be able to deal with. It's okay. You need some help right now. This isn't easy to deal with—"

"Shut up," she retorted, anger flecking her voice. "It's true. Don't carry all the weight and just pretend it's fine." Her eyes flickered back to meet his, her cerulean spiking hundreds of emotions at once at him—desperation, fear, anger, sadness, worry…"And you were always there. You went through everything to make sure that I'm fine. Even back in college. Even now—you changed your plans for me when you should be heading back to the Fire Nation."

She stopped and he considered saying something back, but decided against it, thinking it was better for her to vent herself.

Her eyes softened. "It's just like Aang. What was the last thing I told him? Don't be late for the flight? I was never able to ever tell him how much I truly loved him and how much I…he was such a good husband, such a good man, such a good father, and I knew he loved me, and it was all I ever needed to get through the day. I was never able to tell him that I loved him as much as he loved me—I just thought that maybe he'd know without me telling him and that eventually it would come one day. I thought we would have a whole lifetime together and I'd be able to do so much with him. I turned down so much—god, I just focused so much on work and on taking care of Kya and myself, I practically ignored him when he came back home from work. I'm so selfish—Aang, do this for me, do that for me—and telling him that I didn't have time for his jokes or his suggestions of places to go or things to do.

"And now he's gone!" she concluded, fresh hot tears racing down her face. Zuko bit his lip and tried to keep eye contact with her, seeing his own vision blur. But shit, he was feeling that ball form in his throat once again. He couldn't let her see him cry—she would just tear up even more and rip herself to shreds even more, saying that it was all her fault again.

So he wrapped his arms around her instead, putting his face over her shoulder, pretending that the warm tears that she felt trailing down her cheek were solely her own.

He forced his voice out. "I'm sure he knew how much you loved him. Trust me, I know that he knew how much you were willing to give him and I know he knew how much you loved him."

Her breathing stilled against his ear, her warm exhale creeping over the shell of his ear and the base of his jaw.

"It's just like how I haven't acknowledged how much you've done for me," she said, barely audible even though she was pressed up against him. He felt her arms separate them and his hands dropped to his side. But she was quick to pull him back into a tight embrace, arms above his shoulders and practically around his neck.

She smelled of salt and crushed hope.

He felt her pull away from him, but now one hand was at his tear-ached neck, the other holding his cheek. He attempted to blink the telltale tears out of his eyes before she could notice, but what was the point? The sadness he was holding had already spilled over one of his lower eyelids.

Her eyebrows creased further—he didn't think they could have furrowed any deeper—and her lips pursed. "I'm making you cry," she said, her thumb catching a tear and painting it over his skin.

He pulled his head down. "It's nothing, don't worry about it."

She raised his head back up to face her, her eyes worried with his face in a blue reflection.

"I'm so sorry," she apologized. "You're just taking all my grief. I was being selfish again; I barely remembered that you're upset too."

He closed his eyes to clear his vision and willed himself to not form any more tears, feeling her massage his discarded tears into his cheek.

"I could always turn to you, you know?" she remarked, almost lightly. "You've always been there for me, through all those tough times and everything. I was so happy when he told me that you were going to be visiting us—I hadn't heard from you in so long. I thought I lost you forever. I was scared, maybe. I thought maybe…you weren't going to always be there like I thought."

Another thought occurred to her and she interrupted herself. "And maybe I just felt like shit because from the beginning I wasn't sure if…I had loved him as much as he loved me. And that since it's gotten so much further that I didn't know if he got what he wanted from me in the end…if I was the right person for him all along, you know?"

"I mean," she corrected himself. "For a long time, I thought that maybe I had only gone out with Aang because you…—I just didn't hear from you while you were in the Earth Nation and I thought you were…busy or something."

Self-hatred flickered over her eyes. "I'm just always latching onto someone…" she mumbled, her eyes looking to the side.

He focused his sight elsewhere—he couldn't process anything that she was doing, anything that she was saying.

Eventually his eyes trailed back to her face to see if she was doing okay, but was surprised to see cerulean already staring back at him.

"You've always been there for me, huh?" she asked softly.

Time must have collapsed beneath her gaze, because that second she spent looking over him, to admire the face of the man that had supported her from the very beginning, felt like an eternity to him, watching her appreciative eyes linger on the features and contours of his eyebrows, cheekbones, nose, jaw, lips…

He barely noticed when she dipped closer towards him until he caught her eyes closing, her nose brushing against his own, her slow exhale caressing his mouth—

Immediately, he turned his head to the left and brought her into an embrace, letting her lips fall into his neck instead, feeling her stunted breath and fallen tears against his collarbone.

After a moment, she pulled away from him, putting her face in her hands. "I'm sorry," she simply apologized. "I completely—"

"You don't have to explain," he said, stopping her and putting an arm around her shoulders in a half-hug. "It's getting late. Let's go prepare something to eat. I'm sure Kya's stomach will be whining soon." He stood up and put out a hand to help Katara up as well, which she gladly took before heading off wordlessly into the kitchen.

Zuko removed his jacket from around his shoulders, heading towards the coat rack before changing his mind and instead, throwing his jacket onto the couch by his suitcase. He went over to Kya's room, letting some light trickle into her bedroom before swinging open the door completely. But the girl was a light-sleeper—or maybe she was already awake—and she called out, "Hello?"

"Hey Kya," he replied, bringing himself down to her level. She swung her feet off her bed and rubbed her stomach.

"Hungry," she stated, something that didn't surprise him.

It had been a long appetite-less day at the public city funeral service and the following private funeral service.

"Come," he beckoned and the two-year-old was soon perched upon his shoulder as he stepped out towards the kitchen, bending his back to make sure that her head didn't hit the top of the door frame as they headed out of her room. The smell of spaghetti sauce wafted from the kitchen and Zuko could feel the daughter's excitement at the promise of some nourishment.

He dropped her off in the seat that normally Aang would be sitting in, leaving him to sit in Kya's seat.

Soon after, the three of them were sitting around the table, getting through a simple but delicious and warm plate of pasta and sauce. Kya received extra napkins, but at one point, Zuko was accused of having some sauce on his cheek, and also for slurping noodles.

Once dinner was eaten, Zuko joined Katara in the kitchen to help her clean up.

He broke the silence. "I'm leaving tomorrow," he said.

He could barely hear her over the clink of dishes.

"Okay," she replied softly.

**divider**

"Uncle Zuko leaving?" Kya's eyes widened with shock as she raced out of the hallway, having heard a familiar sound of a rolling suitcase.

Zuko affirmed this fact, while he parked his suitcase by the door and reached down to put his shoes on. Katara stood to the side, near the door, ready to open it for him. "Come here," he said, his arms open wide and receptive for a bear hug from the little girl, who was quick to give him one.

When he stood up, he glanced over at Katara, who looked as though she was expecting an embrace as well, something he gladly presented her, locking her in his arms for a good few seconds before letting go.

"I'll be leaving now, then," he whispered in her ear. "Best of luck with everything. I'm sure you'll be fine though."

She suddenly remembered something, and quickly whipped the watch off her left wrist. "Here, your watch back," she reminded him, holding out it out towards his left arm.

He waved that hand. "No, keep it," he replied.

"But then you wouldn't have a watch…"

"I'm sure I have another one lying around my house somewhere," he assured. "Also I'll be sending you guys some money once I get back to the Fire Nation," he added. "Just supporting you guys until you return to work or whenever."

He didn't bother to look at her face, which he was sure was full of grateful shock. Instead, he looked down towards her daughter. "And one more thing," he said, kneeling back down and reaching into his right pocket. "This is for you."

A silver necklace with a gem of an amazing shade of blue was produced from his jacket and he held it out to Kya. Her hands reached out for it while her lips formed an O and her eyes widened in surprise.

"So beautiful!" Kya exclaimed, her hands catching the pendant and running her fingers over the cerulean gem.

"Yes," Zuko agreed. "Very beautiful."

…

"_Ah! Another one of you young folk! Summer must be _the _season, huh?" asked a shrill male voice as he walked into the small shop._

_Zuko couldn't help the smile that crept over his lips. "I guess…" he said, almost feeling embarrassed for being there, and very tempted to just walk out of the jeweler's shop and pretend that he never had the idea to marry at all._

"_Alright, tell me who's the lucky one? What's the story, boy?"_

_Not able to bring his eyes to face the shopkeeper, he glanced over at the showcase of rings at the counter. "Uh…she's in Republic City and, uh…yeah."_

_The jeweler laughed, understanding his lack of words. "How long have you known her, then?" he asked, encouraging Zuko on._

_He didn't know the answer off the top of his head, and quickly counted backwards. _

_It felt like an eternity since he knew her._

"_About four years," he answered._

"_Ah, so what are your plans then? Take her back here in the Fire Nation or stay up there?"_

_Zuko shook his head. "I have no idea yet. I just know I want to marry her."_

"_Well that's all you really need in the end, isn't it? Love?"_

_At this, Zuko couldn't talk anymore. This was just too embarrassing. He just laughed it off._

"_So, down to business though," declared the jeweler, noticing Zuko's faint blush. "Have you thought about rings at all? What kind of rings does she like?"_

_Zuko smiled sheepishly. "I actually I'm not the kind of person that would know…I'm sure she'd appreciate something more on the simple side though." And then remembering her gazes at the full moon, he added, "Silver."_

"_Hm," replied the other man. "Well there are definitely a lot of 'simple' designs…how small are her hands? That might help determine which ones are the better fit."_

"_Um…small," Zuko answered, and the other man guffawed at his response. "Like, her fingers would reach the top joint of my fingers," he defended._

"_So like one or two rings sizes smaller than your ring size."_

"_I guess."_

"_It's only too bad that it's usually the male that goes out to find an engagement ring—I'm sure it would make my job easier if it were females that were looking for the rings," chuckled the jeweler. "Don't worry, I have many many years of experience."_

_For a moment, the jeweler reminded Zuko of his own uncle, and the younger man bit his lip and refocused on his task at hand, watching the jeweler determine the ring size he'd need._

"_So is she a glamorous girl that loves large jewels?"_

"_Oh no, not at all," Zuko replied, recalling that the only thing she actually wore was her mother's necklace, and that her hair was practically always tied back. She dressed like a tomboy and used no makeup, aside from the times that Suki insisted Katara paint her face._

"_So I'm thinking that the band shouldn't have any etchings on it, and should fit a smaller gem."_

"_Okay."_

"_Is money an issue for you?"_

_Zuko looked up at him. "Money isn't the priority," he confirmed. "Just what's best for her."_

_The jeweler smiled. "Okay then, young man. I have four rings that I think she might like, based on the great amount of description that you have given me about her," he said, rather sarcastically._

_Zuko laughed softly and looked over the templates, one of them catching his eye. "Ah, this one for sure."_

"_What makes you so sure?"_

_He gazed down at the ring design, a rather straightforward one that curved in opposite directions towards the pocket for the gem. "It looks like the waves of the ocean," he replied._

"_And I think a cushion cut would fit well with that one," added the jeweler, pushing forward a laminated sheet of different jewel cuts and pointing to the respective one. "This must all be nonsense to you."_

"_For sure. Thank you so much for helping me out."_

"_It's what I do, young man," said the jeweler, writing down some information on a notepad. "Diamond, right? That's your typical engagement ring."_

_A thought occurred to Zuko. "I was thinking maybe a different one."_

"_Oh?" but the man didn't question him anymore. "Would you like to see a few other crystals then? Is there a specific shade?"_

"_Blue."_

_The jeweler took him inside to gaze at a few sample gems, and never in his life did Zuko ever imagine that there were so many rocks in the world that were the most gorgeous shades of blue._

_But there was only one shade that he was looking out for, and he recognized her eyes in the multitude of crystals straight away._

"_Those," he said, his eyes imprisoned by the cerulean stare._

…

While Kya continued to admire her new pendant, Zuko looked up at Katara, whose face was creased in a loving gaze at her daughter. Her eyes met his for a brief moment and he smiled, relieved that the pendant's centerpiece was almost the exact replica of her eyes—though he admitted that there was really no crystal that could contain both the color and the depth of Katara's ocean orbs and that there was no gem in the world that could hold him longer than her cerulean eyes.

She thanked him, under her silent gaze and he returned to Kya, unclasping the pendant and putting it around her neck before clicking the jewelry shut. For now, it was a bit large on Kya, but the girl still had a lot of growing to do.

For the first time, he had taken the ring out of his pocket. Instead of what he had originally planned, he had gone to a nearby jeweler to get the gem taken out of it and placed into a silver pendant, deciding it was a better way to get rid of the ring. He had even let the welder melt down the silver from the ring's band to incorporate into the new silver necklace, completely freeing his hands.

"This is so that you know that Uncle's always going to be there for you, okay?" he told her quietly, tapping the gem against her.

Kya shook her head vigorously.

"What do you say, Kya?" Katara's voice drifted from above them.

Taking her eyes off her new accessory, Kya looked up at Zuko's face and hugged him, small arms reaching as far around him as possible and forcing a small laugh out of him. "Thank you, Uncle Zu!"

Zuko slowly stood up, meeting Katara's eyes again. They embraced once more before he took hold of his suitcase again and opened the door to the outside.

"Thank you," she said, and her eyes contained the rest of the words that she wished to say.

"Goodbye, Katara," he replied softly.

She struggled to figure out more things to say, not finding her gratitude enough. "B-Be safe! Good luck with the company! Please call us!"

He nodded, ignoring the sting in his eye. Looking a bit down past Katara, he waved to Kya. "Bye, Kya!"

"Wait!" the girl exclaimed, leaping forward, and he squatted down to level his face with hers.

Her dark mahogany eyes stared straight into his.

"Uncle Zuko come back?"

And then he smiled.

"Perhaps."

* * *

**Well, the end. Now that this story is off my back, whatcha guys think of it overall? Was the end satisfying? I literally spent a good hour staring at the last four lines and changed the last word at least three times before changing it back to what I had originally written. Anyway, I'd love to know what you guys think!**

**I guess I have to admit that this story wasn't as Zutara as some of you guys had been expecting, and I sincerely apologize for letting your hopes up like that, but in the end I decided that this might be the best ending (at least for this story—who knows if I might come up with a continuation for this later) because I wanted Zuko to come out of this having learned something, or having gotten something off his back, which he did—by means of getting rid of the ring and the watch. Of course, leaving them with his things creates a lingering presence of him with them all the time now, but whatever, y'all can interpret the end as many ways as you like.**

**Basically, I didn't think it seemed right for Zuko to step in and just marry her or join the family, because—although I do love Zutara—based on the way that I've written his character so far, I don't think he would have done it. He isn't an opportunist in that way—he feels deeply sorry about what happened to Aang and is going to support their family, but doesn't want to break the integrity of it. Also, I'm sure he'd be concerned about Katara and how torn she would feel if he did eventually become Aang's 'replacement.' He probably wouldn't want to be the one taking Aang's place for when he's gone anyway, which you see when he's uncomfortable taking Aang's seat and even with the coat rack and especially when he spends in those two nights in their bed.**

**Enough of that rant though, here's the entire story in chronological timeline as I had promised you guys earlier. Feel free to read it again—I might have forgotten a few details here and there but you guys can fill it in! This part of my rant might feel nostalgic (at least it does to me) while you review what you've read this past…few months? I don't remember how long this story took to get out.**

**...**

**Essentially the entire storyline can be broken down into four parts: college, abroad, retreat, and current.**

**College:**

**Zuko, coming in from the Fire Nation, meets Sokka when he's a sophomore at Republic City University and they become good friends because they're on the same sports team for a while (volleyball—idk, I thought of Azula beating the crap out of the other side during that Beach episode). The following year, Katara is introduced to him and they start to form their relationship and Zuko is quick to realize that Katara trusts and confides in him, even while he was still trying to figure out how to act around his friend's younger sister. Meanwhile, Suki, who is Katara's best friend, starts in a love-conclusive relationship with Sokka. **

**One more year passes, and Zuko is a senior—Katara and him are definitely close (this is the flashback where she just invites herself to sleep on his bed). After another year, when Zuko is starting his co-term (fifth year) Aang and Toph join the gang and everyone's happy. Zuko, at this point, begins to realize that he loves Katara, and shows her that wonderful waterfall place, promising her that he'd keep in contact with her after graduation, which is soon approaching.**

**The day before his co-term graduation, he takes Katara back to the waterfall, where he suddenly realizes that he should tell her that he loves her, but she interrupts him by declaring that she loved him.**

**Abroad:**

**Zuko decided, on his own, that he should go out and travel for a few years to get some experience before settling down and working (think of it as a gap year, or a few). He gets onto a plane to travel several days after his graduation, and Katara gives him a watch before take off.**

**At some point, he goes to the South Water Nation and helps them create a computer model to help predict the best places to build their more important structures, since they had a bit of developmental problems due to their environment (which I can imagine they have).**

**He later eventually is in the Fire Nation, working temporarily for Hitachi (meaning sunrise—I thought it perfect that the company in the Fire Nation be called that) and develops a patent for a device the redirects lightning (ahahaha! A mini canon detail turned AU) that can also store the energy from it to power devices (think solar panel but lightening is the energy source). He calls Katara, for the first time (since it had always been her contacting him) and they talk for a long while. While she gives him updates on what's going on, he realizes that he wanted to be with her forever, and he plans to propose to her when he gets back to Republic City. It's relatively important that he just decides to this because he wants to, as opposed to overthinking everything like he always did, something that he thought always led him the wrong track.**

**Mai calls him shortly after, having heard about him in the news and wondering if he would hang out with her. He gifts her knives and she gifts him a watch—now the second that he has in possession. He tells her that he's leaving the Fire Nation, effectively letting her know that he was probably not going to be relationship material with her.**

**Before leaving the Fire Nation, he buys the engagement ring, which is the color of her cerulean eye, after a long deliberation. Then he leaves the Fire Nation to a more or less third world type Earth Nation village.**

**At the Earth Nation village, he loses connection and cannot talk to his friends at all during the lapse of the two years that he is there. (It is also implied, though I never mention it, that Aang and Katara had started their relationship while Zuko was unaware, working his ass off in the Earth Nation village to create running water and electricity for the village. Hence, Zuko was not able to talk to Katara/know that she was in a relationship with him until…well later.) When his work is complete, he realizes that one of the girls, Jin, has fallen in love with him and they share a kiss aside the lighted fountain before he remembers that being with Katara is just within his reach. In fact, the next plane was going to take him to Republic City.**

**Retreat:**

**He lands in Republic City, having been impatient on the entire plane ride back. He comes to propose to Katara, when she tells him the news of her marriage with Aang, which is the week coming up.**

**Zuko attends the wedding, and while sitting in the pew seat, develops a backache that never quite goes away afterwards. The following day after their wedding, he wakes up from a nap, a call from a real estate agent that gets back to him about his inquiry on buying a larger house (indicating that he had already begun to make plans for a family with Katara) but he turns down the offer and states that he needs a smaller place to live.**

**He leaves Republic City, deciding that living in the Fire Nation was best for him, one of the reasons being that there is a lot of distance between him and Katara. He lives in a small place, changes his phone number, puts that black jacket with the engagement ring still in its pocket in the depths of his closet, and doesn't contact any of his friends at Republic City again until he decides that after ten years, he might want to see them, aka Katara. (We also find out that he had been working for some company in the Fire Nation and putting out lots of patents and just being a smart modest guy in general. He also doesn't get into any relationships during his singleton life in the Fire Nation.) He is invited over by Aang, who also offers his couch for Zuko's week-long stay in Republic City.**

**Current:**

**Well…it's basically everything that wasn't in italics the past few chapters. But I guess I can go over the main points. **

**He catches up with the couple, finding Aang is the mayor and Katara is pregnant with a two year old, Kya. Aang leaves for a flight to go to a conference and Katara gives Aang her watch. Zuko also finds that the engagement ring is still in that jacket pocket. After helping Kya fall asleep, Katara offers Zuko a share of her bed because of his back pain.**

**Zuko wakes up to a dream of Katara's next kid having his eyes. The rest of the day is committed to visiting Sokka and Suki, who have kids of their own. They come back for dinner, which Zuko helps Katara prepare. The news is given to Katara that Aang has passed.**

**They mourn that night. The next morning, she goes to deal with funeral preparations and Zuko offers Katara her watch since she seemed to need it to make sure she got there on time. She recognizes that the watch is the one that she had given to him. **

**The funeral is set for Tuesday the next week, which is conflicting with Zuko's schedule when he had originally planned to leave on Monday of the next week, but he doesn't do anything about it just yet. Katara's appetite is poor and he makes her tea, evoking a laugh from her. She begins to eat afterwards. After that dinner, she tells Kya that her father has passed.**

**That morning he goes out to get something to eat at a nearby café. When coming back to the house, he hesitates on hanging his jacket on the coat rack, mostly because he doesn't feel as though he belongs as part of the family, but Katara ends up hanging his jacket on the coat rack for him, seeing no significance in the matter. It seems she has also set the table so that his place is at Aang's seat. He is very uncomfortable, but doesn't make a big deal out of it.**

**For that day, he takes Kya out to the park, also feeding her some food from the vendor, which Kya thinks is reminiscent of her father. She later discusses her father's death, the concept of which she is sweetly ignorant of, at her age, with Zuko while sipping hot chocolate.**

**The following day, Katara is sitting in front of the TV watching a report on her husband's death and to cheer her up, he takes her back to the waterfall, where she tells him that she loves him again, in the same manner as she did before. That night, she feels the need for company and tells Zuko to join her on the bed, where they share a relatively intimate moment.**

**Zuko calls his boss to give him an indefinite time to deal with "family matters." It's clear that Zuko is starting to feel incorporated into this makeshift family, and he easily places his jacket on the coat rack that he originally had trouble with, and also joins Katara in her cooking as well as sitting down in Aang's seat to eat. In fact, during the funeral, he is at Katara's side in the family line.**

**Katara, after the funeral, is emotionally breaking down and she apologizes immensely for everything that she had done and everything that she hadn't gotten to do. She kisses Zuko, but he prevents this. He realizes that he has to detach, and finds that he can no longer place his jacket on the coat rack, and places Kya in Aang's seat during dinner and also sleeps on the couch. At some point, he goes to the jeweler and gets the jewel out of the ring and puts it into a necklace that is tucked away into his pocket.**

**The day that he goes to fly back to the Fire Nation, he tells Katara to keep his watch since he probably has one back at home (well, he did receive two watches in his life) and gifts the pendant to Kya (which…you can interpret however you would like, whether it's that he's now focusing on making sure Aang and Katara's offspring are protected or whatever), saying that he'd always be there for them. He assures Katara that he'd financially support them until she was able to work again and then leaves, telling Kya that he'd be back "perhaps."**

**...**

**Augh, now my story just seems like something that could have been much much shorter—no wonder I had originally thought it would work as a one-shot. But anyways, now with all this clarified, you guys can go back and read for those tiny details and hints that I dropped in the story ;)!**

**I guess I can discuss the originations of this story. Just a Dream is a great song, as I mentioned in a previous author note—and well, this story started off in a Notepad document and I was like, oh wow, let me do this "I had a ring that was never used" thing. And then I was like…huh, I like tension/intimate scenes, I shall make them be in the same bed and torture Zuko even more! Muaha! But then I had to figure out how to do that so I had Aang go on a journey, but then I thought, what if…he dies? So I weighed making Aang die vs not using that cliché thing and decided that I might as well experiment and see what happens. Then I had the brilliant idea of the necklace. And everything was made up on the fly from there. Of course, I wanted to give the illusion that I had actually given everything some thought, so I placed some symbols here and there, but for the most part the flashbacks and everything from when Aang died to the necklace scene was a free for all write. But blah blah blah, if you just read that, kudos kudos kudos to you—I'm on caffeine and I feel the need to blabber on.**

**Mmpfh, by far this is the longest author note I have ever written.**

**Anyway…aw man, I have to say that I'm going to actually miss writing this story (especially this AU world—it totally took off well and just created itself O.o) and I'm definitely going to miss hearing from you guys! Anyone want to take a guess at which parts of the story were my favorites to write? **

**Drop a review while I go ahead to my next story project! (This is the last time that I'm asking—begging, really—…at least in this story!) Love you all and perhaps I'll be seeing you guys a bit more later! Enjoy the holidays!**

**Best, **

**thir13enth**


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